The Science Museum is a major London tourist attraction; as other publicly funded national museums in the United Kingdom, the Science Museum does not charge an admission fee.

When Queen Victoria ordered to build the museum, she also stated that the museum had to be named after her and her late husband. This was initially done to the entire museum, but when that new building finally opened ten years later, the title was confined to the Art Collections and the Science Collections. On June 26, 1909 the Science Museum, as an independent entity, was born.

Today, the Science Museum holds a collection of over 300,000 items, including famous items as Stephenson’s Rocket, Puffing Billy (the oldest steam locomotive), the first jet engine, the reconstruction of Francis Crick and James Watson’s model of DNA, and the documentation of the first typewriter, just to name a few. Recently the IMAX 3D Cinema showing science and nature documentaries as well as the Wellcome Wing, which focuses on digital technology, have been added to the museum.

The museum displays some of the many objects collected by Henry Wellcome about medical discoveries. The fourth floor, called "Glimpses of Medical History", holds reconstructions and display cases of the history of practiced medicine. The fifth floor gallery is called "Science and the Art of Medicine", with exhibits medical gadgets and practices from a long time ago from different countries. The collection holds various exhibits about clinical medicine, biosciences and public health; the museum is part of the London Museums of Health & Medicine.

The Science Museum also has a library, and until the 1960s it belonged to the Britain's National Library for Science, Medicine and Technology. It holds issues of periodicals, early books and manuscripts, and it is used by scholars of all over the globe.

The Science Museum's medical collections have a global scope and coverage’ it includes Clinical Medicine, Biosciences, and Public Health. The new Wellcome Wing, which focuses the most on Bioscience, makes the Museum the world's leading center for the presentation of contemporary science to the public.

In November 2003, the Science Museum opened a new section, called the Dana Centre; the center is an urban bar and café connected to the museum.

From time to time, the Science Museum organizes an event called "Science Night"; up to 380 children between the age of 8 and 11, are allowed to spend an evening performing fun "science based" activities, and then spend the night sleeping in the museum galleries amongst the exhibits. In the morning, they are served breakfast and get to enjoy more science, watching an IMAX film before the end of the event. Because of their young age, children must be accompanied by adults.

The Science Museum comprises a number of galleries, some of which are permanent, and some of which are temporary.

When visitors first enter the museum, the East Hall is the first area, stretching up through three floors. On the ground, the area is mostly filled with legendary steam engines of different types, including the oldest surviving James Watt beam engine, which goes back to the British industrial revolution period. Hanging from the ceiling, is a huge metallic ring, the inside of which is covered in white LED lights that form designs and display messages that visitors have typed in the kiosks at the Energy gallery.

The Exploring Space area is a historical gallery, filled with rockets and exhibits that relate to the story of human space exploration and the benefits that space exploration has improved our world with, especially in the world of telecommunications.

The gallery by the name of Making the Modern World, is a recent built gallery, in which some of the museum's most iconic objects, such as Stephenson’s Rocket and the Apollo spacecraft, are creatively displayed along with a timeline chronicling man's technological achievements.

Flight is another gallery, close to the western end of the third floor; in this gallery there are several full sized airplanes and helicopters, including Alcock and Brown’s transatlantic Vickers Vimy, Spitfire and Hurricane fighters, along with aero-engines and a section of a Boeing 747.

One of the main attractions in the museum is the interactive Launchpad gallery; redesigned and reopened in November 2007, the new gallery has well over 50 interactive exhibits that illustrate various concepts and topics of physical science. The gallery is staffed with employees called the Explainers, who are there to demonstrate and to explain how exhibits work, to conduct live experiments, and to perform shows to schools and the visiting public.

The Science Museum in London, offers various attractions to different age ranges and tastes; it remains a major British tourist attraction, but at the same time it withholds culture and history.