Ranked: TARDIS console rooms

The Doctor has travelled in the same Type 40 TARDIS since he first appeared on our screens in 1963. He has, however, used a number of different console rooms during his centuries of time travel, some awe-inspiring and some just ugly. Here is a list ranking each one from the worst to the best.

8. Grey

An updated version of the original white console room, this design was used by the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Doctors between The Invisible Enemy and Survival, with the new console being added in The Five Doctors. 

While the TARDIS seemed expansive when Ian and Barbara first entered the TARDIS, this console room feels cramped and uncomfortable and overly sterile. The added classical columns are ugly and the console has dated badly. Like the white room became in the advent of colour television, this room was overlit and overexposed. It's terribly boring to look at.

7. Copper

With the soft reboot of series 5 we got a new Doctor and a new TARDIS console room to go along with him, lasting from The Eleventh Hour until its final appearance in The Angels Take Manhattan.

The new room is a whimsical room that wouldn't be out of place in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, making the TARDIS look more like a childish funhouse than a stolen time machine. The console itself is made up of bits and bobs like taps and a typewriter, but the machine itself made it. It wasn't cobbled together by the Doctor but was generated by the TARDIS after the destruction of the coral console room. Why would the TARDIS do this and how did it have a screen made by Magpie Electricals? This console room is an orange eyesore. 

6. War

Bridging the classic series with the modern one just as its occupant the War Doctor does, this console room was seen only in The Day of the Doctor.

This room is a merging of the original white console room (with the roundel walls arranged in the same shape as the grey room) and the coral theme first used by the Ninth Doctor. It's quite claustrophobic and bare, which suits the War Doctor but doesn't make the TARDIS feel very big at all.

5. Wood

The Fourth Doctor and Sarah began using the secondary console room in The Masque of Mandragora until they returned to the primary console room (in its grey theme) in The Invisible Enemy.

This console room is a massive departure from the white one used since the show's inception, eschewing the classic look of science fiction for an almost steam-punk one of wood and stained-glass. The result is a refreshing and interesting set despite feeling somewhat claustrophobic and having a relatively dull console that lacks the iconic time rotor.

4. Coral

A huge departure from the classic series, this console room was used by the Ninth and Tenth (and, very briefly, the Eleventh) Doctors from Rose until its destruction in The Eleventh Hour. As the first console room of the modern series, it's iconic to many.

Its dome shape does make the room feel rather self-contained, making the TARDIS feel rather small, but this console room does make the time machine feel a lot more like a rickety old ship in disrepair than ever before. The scanner, a fixture of the console room, is gone (which is somewhat impractical) and the roundels are hinted at.

3. White

This theme was used by the First, Second, Third and Fourth Doctors from An Unearthly Child until The Masque of Mandragora, when the Fourth Doctor began using the secondary console room. 

The mixture of the alien sterility and computer banks with the earthly wooden chair and coat stand are a perfect combination of science fiction and the mundane. The room is updated over the years, with the roundels changing and the chair being removed, so that the room starts to feel quite cramped, most notably during Jon Pertwee's run. It never feels as big as it did during season 1.

2. Parlour

The Seventh Doctor replaces his ugly grey console room for this Victorian (or pseudovictorian as Will Arrowsmith says) parlour also used by the Eighth Doctor, which makes its only appearance in Doctor Who: The Movie.

More expansive than ever before, this console room is part unwelcoming time machine and part homely manor house. It is a tasteful, old-fashioned room that serves as the spiritual successor to the wooden secondary console room, being much more hospitable and having a far more interesting console. The collection of clocks is a bit on-the-nose and perhaps it's a little too cosy but overall this is a beautiful room with the first time rotor to extend all the way to the ceiling.

1. Neon

Used by the Eleventh and Twelfth Doctors, this console room makes its first appearance in The Snowmen and is slightly redecorated by the Twelfth Doctor in Deep Breath.

The jovial copper console room is discarded by the Eleventh Doctor in favour of one that feels a lot more like a time machine, all metal (as Bill points out) and inhospitable. There are additional controls around the console, which feels more functional than any of the modern themes - the copper was a little silly and the coral console was lacking in controls. The Twelfth Doctor adds bookshelves to the upper levels which adds a hint of the pseudovictorian room, although he mourns that he can't find any roundels. This is a fantastic console room that more than earns its place at the top of this list.

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