Review: Jurassic World: The Experience (London)

This interactive experience, based on the multi-billion-dollar franchise, lets visitors get up close and personal with over a dozen dinosaurs from the Mesozoic Era.

Photo: Universal Studios/Amblin Entertainment Inc

After a successful run at ExCel London in 2022, Jurassic World: The Experience returns to the capital in an updated form within NEON at Battersea Power Station. This walkthrough experience, which lasts between 45 and 55 minutes, is packed full of outstanding animatronics, offers endless photo opportunities, and lets visitors get up close and personal with a number of dinosaurs from across the Jurassic World series, including Blue (Jurassic World) and Bumpy (Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous).

As someone who grew up visiting the Natural History Museum and marvelling at its T-Rex animatronic, which was also likely the first encounter with the size and ferocity of dinosaurs for countless children in the 1990s and 2000s, it's fair to say that the dinosaur-loving kids of today don't know how good they've got it...

Photo: Universal Studios/Amblin Entertainment Inc

The experience begins with a journey on the ferry to Isla Nublar, which features a slickly produced introductory video as in-ferry entertainment. The video explains that upon docking, guests will be welcomed into the world-class tourist destination as VIP guests and have been granted exclusive access to see parts of the park not usually open to the general public, including the Genetic Creation Lab and Raptor Training Facilities.

There's a notable lack of familiar faces from the film series in this introductory video, which would have helped solidify the link between the experience and the multi-billion-dollar franchise, but in all honesty, no one is attending Jurassic World: The Experience to see a pre-recorded video of Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard - they're here to see dinosaurs.

Photo: Universal Studios/Amblin Entertainment Inc

After disembarking, visitors enter through the Jurassic World gates and find themselves immediately face-to-face with a number of the show's animatronic dinosaurs, including a family of Pachyrhinosaurus and a two-storey tall Brachiosaurus, whose head and neck sways back and forth above the foliage. The attention to detail in these animatronics, and all of the ones that follow, is truly impressive and stands alongside, if not exceeds, the quality you'd expect from any of the Universal theme parks' Jurassic-based offerings.

While these dinosaurs are great to admire from afar, there are more up-close and personal interactions to be had with several baby dinosaurs, which are cradled in the arms of Park Rangers throughout the venue. With the dinosaurs on show rotating frequently, there's nearly always a baby pterodactyl or velociraptor on hand for photos and pets.

With blinking eyes and heads that move in response to human touch, these puppets are full of life and deliver on the promise of the show being an interactive Jurassic World experience. For the children visiting, it's an instant draw, with groups of people quickly forming around them, but ample time and attention are given to every group that wishes to pet them, so there's no missing out.

Photo: Universal Studios/Amblin Entertainment Inc

The first half of Jurassic World: The Experience, in which guests spend time around the herbivores, is completely free-roam and allows groups to explore at their own pace. Beside every large-scale animatronic, there are staff members dressed in Jurassic World Park Ranger uniforms, who are all incredibly friendly and happy to chat about the dinosaurs on show and take photos on your behalf without any upsell.

Further into the experience, there's both a Parasaurolophus hiding amongst the trees looking for its offspring and a massive Ankylosaurus with its club-like tail standing behind a fence. Opposite, a Gyrosphere, which featured prominently in the films, offers a photo opportunity for guests, and more Park Rangers are on hand to tell visitors about the dinosaurs.

Photo: Universal Studios/Amblin Entertainment Inc

After encounters with a Parasaurolophus hiding amongst the trees looking for its offspring and a massive Ankylosaurus with its club-like tail, guests enter the Genetic Creation Lab, which rounds off the herbivore portion of guests' Jurassic World experience.

Featuring a trio of baby Parasaurolophus inside an incubator, numerous fossilised mosquitoes on display and an opportunity to compare dinosaur droppings from both herbivores and carnivores through gloves, there are plenty of things to discuss with the white lab coat-wearing staff members, who roam the space alongside guests. The baby dinosaur interactions also keep on coming within the Creation Lab, with a female Stygimoloch, complete with reinforced skull, offered up for the admiration and affection of visitors.

Moving upstairs in NEON, guests enter the carnivore area of Jurassic World as groups and proceed through a series of spaces together, guided by Park Rangers. In the first space, a small waiting area, there's a five-foot-long Tyrannosaurus Rex skull and a chance for younger guests to try their hand at palaeontology by uncovering bones from within a sandpit.

Photo: Universal Studios/Amblin Entertainment Inc

The real start of this section, and perhaps the entire experience, however, is Bumpy. Within the Jurassic World universe, they're the main dinosaur protagonist of Camp Cretaceous - the animated Netflix series set on Isla Nublar, which takes place in the same time period as 2015's Jurassic World film. Within Jurassic World: The Experience, they're presented as another baby dinosaur puppet that guests can meet one-on-one to pet. To describe Bumpy as cute is an understatement, and the reactions of our group confirmed that they immediately stole the hearts of everyone in the room.

Moving into the final rooms of Jurassic World: The Experience, guests come face to face with Blue, the dinosaur protagonist of the recent Jurassic World trilogy, which is the only full-size dinosaur in the experience puppeted by a human performer. Their feeder explains that Blue is the alpha in their family, and we should maintain a distance for our own safety.

Jurassic World: The Experience is one of the few attractions where guests actually expect things to go wrong, and true to form, the sirens soon alarm, and guests are told they must evacuate due to nearby dinosaurs having escaped. In the final room of the show, guests find themselves trapped between a life-sized Tyrannosaurus Rex, which stomps across the room and stops just feet away from guests behind a fence, and a Carnotaurus, which is equally massive and intimidating.

Photo: Universal Studios/Amblin Entertainment Inc

As Park Rangers frantically try to unlock the gate that stands between the group and safety, both dinosaurs wreak havoc on the space by destroying lamp posts and engaging in an extended rally of roars as the sirens and flashing red warning lights continue to blare.

While everyone attending Jurassic World: The Experience knows that at some point, they'll be faced with the film's scariest and most iconic dinosaurs, and it'd be a pretty terrible experience if the Jurassic World staff didn't put guests in a perilous situation, the intensity of this final sequence may well catch some families with young children off guard. For adults and big kids, however, it's a pulse-raising set piece that places guests in a situation on par with that of the films, and the production value more than justifies having the 'Jurassic World' name attached to the experience.

With plenty of meticulously well-crafted animatronics, engaging interactions with both the Park Rangers and dinosaurs, and an action-filled finale, Jurassic World: The Experience is a great time for families and adults alike, even if it's a little short. The only way this experience could be better is if they dressed all the dinosaurs up in Christmas jumpers, but we'll keep going to South Kensington to see that instead...

★★★★

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Jurassic World: The Experience runs at NEON at Battersea Power Station until 30th September 2025. Tickets are priced from £28.95 per person. For more info and to book tickets, visit feverup.com

For more reviews of immersive experiences like Jurassic World: The Experience, check out our recent Reviews.