Food & drink in Iceland

Yes, on your first or second evening. Three hours through the centre with five or six tastings, lamb soup, fish, skyr, rye bread, the famous hot dog, and a guide who explains what Icelanders actually eat versus the tourist menu. It orients you in the city and shortlists restaurants for the rest of your stay. The combos with whale watching (/experience/834461/) or a northern-lights cruise (/experience/834525/) make a full day.

Lamb, raised free on the hills and eaten as soup, roast or smoked as hangikjöt. Fresh fish, cod and arctic char especially, and langoustine in Höfn. Skyr, the thick cultured dairy. Dense rye bread, sometimes baked in geothermal ground. And the hot dog with everything, which is the honest national dish. The fermented shark and sheep's head are for dares, not dinner. Most Icelanders eat them once a year, if that.

Yes. A main course in a mid-range Reykjavík restaurant costs roughly what a good dinner costs in London or Copenhagen, and alcohol is heavily taxed. Ways to soften it: lunch specials and soup-and-bread deals are good value, supermarket chains like Bónus and Krónan are fine for breakfast and picnics, and tap water is excellent and free everywhere. Tipping is not expected; service is included. A food walk is one of the better-value meals because it covers several places.

In Reykjavík and Akureyri, easily; most restaurants have at least one option and several are fully plant-based. Outside towns, choice thins out to soup and salad, so on long day tours bring your own lunch if the stop is a petrol station grill. Food walks can usually adapt tastings if you tell the operator when booking; use the special requests field or email us. Allergies should always be flagged in advance.

Only in state-run Vínbúðin shops, bars and restaurants. Supermarkets sell 2.25 per cent beer and nothing stronger. Vínbúðin has short hours, closes on Sundays and there are none in small villages, so if you want wine at a country guesthouse, buy it in Reykjavík or at the duty-free shop in Keflavík Airport on arrival, which is cheaper than any shop in the country. Drinking age is 20.

From €43 to €264 a person, with a typical price of €126. That is the median of 13 per-person day-tour fares we currently sell. Multi-day packages and private charters are priced differently and sit outside those figures.

Mývatn Öl brewery and beer tasting tour with Mývatn Öl, at €43 a person. Read what it actually is before booking on price alone — the cheapest line is sometimes an admission ticket rather than a guided trip, and a large coach costs less per seat than a small-group minibus because it gives you less time at each stop.

32 of them, from 14 operators: Your Friend in Reykjavik, Mývatn Öl, CityWalk Reykjavik, Freedive Iceland, Nordic Nonsense, Caves of Laugarvatn and 8 more. Every one is a company we hold a contract with — we do not list everything in Iceland, on purpose.

Day tours run from 1 hour to 6 hours, most commonly about 3 hours. Pickup and drop-off are usually inside that figure, so a three-hour tour from Reykjavík can mean closer to four door to door.

3 of these are admissions or tickets rather than guided tours — Private Taxi Transfer Akureyri - Árskógssandur (Hrísey Ferry and Beer Spa) from €139, for instance. Worth knowing if you are driving yourself and only need entry.

13 of 32 (41%) offer pickup. The rest ask you to meet on location. Pickup is the single most common cause of a missed tour in Iceland: it runs to a window rather than a time, and the bus will not wait long.

17 of the 32 are private, the other 15 are shared departures. Private costs more in total but is priced per vehicle, so for four or more people it often works out close per head — and you set the pace.

Across the next 360 days of live availability we hold departures in October, November, December, January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September. That is a rolling window rather than the whole year, so a month missing from that list is not necessarily a month with nothing running.

5 of 32 run only part of the year; the other 27 run all year round. In Iceland that is usually about daylight or ice rather than demand.

Cutoffs run from 1 to 12 hours before departure, and 11 of them accept bookings inside 24 hours — so booking the night before is often possible. Popular winter tours sell out days ahead regardless of the cutoff.

25 of 32 (78%) allow free cancellation at least 24 hours before departure. The exact window is on each tour page and comes from the operator's own policy, not ours. If the operator cancels for weather you are refunded in full.

Operators rate them: 25 easy, 6 very easy, 1 moderate. Iceland's ratings assume weather — an easy walk in still air is a different proposition in 15 m/s of wind.

7 of the 32 set one, ranging from 12 to 20 years. The rest have no stated minimum, which usually means infants are allowed but not that the tour suits them.

22 of 32 are marked family-friendly by the operator. That is their judgement rather than ours, and it usually means the walking is short and the vehicle has a toilet.

Operators have flagged accessibility on some: 9 for prams and strollers, 9 for wheelchair users, 6 for limited mobility, 5 for limited sight. Ring us before booking rather than relying on the flag alone — Icelandic sites vary enormously and a flag does not describe the terrain at the stop.

Varies by operator. Across these: food and drink on 9, admission fees on 4, goods and services tax on 2, wi-fi on board on 2, parking fees on 1. Anything not listed as included is not included — Icelandic operators are literal about this.

29 of 32 are guided in person, with guiding offered in Danish, English, French, German, Icelandic, Italian and 5 more. English is standard on every shared departure in Iceland; other languages usually mean a private guide.

They start from Capital Region (Reykjavík), Akureyri & the North, Golden Circle area (Selfoss, Flúðir, Þingvellir). Where a tour starts matters more in Iceland than how long it lasts: the same tour from Reykjavík and from Vík are different days entirely.

The operator cancels and refunds you in full — Icelandic operators cancel readily, and that is a good sign rather than a bad one. What they will not do is refund you for a tour that ran and simply had poor visibility. Wind cancels more tours here than rain or cold.