Search churches in Sheffield
Find churches across Sheffield and the rest of South Yorkshire.
Historic churches in Sheffield
- Sheffield Cathedral: the Cathedral Church of St Peter and St Paul on Church Street began as the town's medieval parish church and became a cathedral in 1914. Its blend of medieval fabric and striking 20th-century additions mirrors the city itself, and its Archer Project has served homeless people from the premises for decades.
- St Marie's Cathedral: the Roman Catholic cathedral tucked just off Fargate, a fine Victorian Gothic church by Matthew Hadfield with a strong musical life.
- Upper Chapel, Norfolk Street: Sheffield's oldest Nonconformist building, a 1700 Unitarian chapel that recalls the city's dissenting roots.
- St Paul's, Parson Cross and the estate churches: 20th-century churches built with the great housing estates, still serving their neighbourhoods.
A city that experiments with church
Sheffield has an outsized reputation among people who study church life in Britain. St Thomas' Church, Crookes, an Anglican and Baptist partnership, grew in the 1990s into one of the largest congregations in the north and spawned networks of missional communities that have been copied worldwide. Its successor congregations, including St Thomas' Philadelphia in the old industrial quarter, still gather thousands weekly. Alongside this sit strong student churches near the two universities, Caribbean and African congregations in Burngreave and Pitsmoor, Chinese and Slovak Roma fellowships, and steady Anglican, Methodist and Catholic parish life from Hillsborough to Dore. The Nine O'Clock Service of the early 1990s, for all its later troubles, began here too, a reminder that Sheffield has always been willing to try new things on a Sunday.
Browse Sheffield churches in the directory
See every church we list in Sheffield, or widen the search to Rotherham, Barnsley and Doncaster on our South Yorkshire county page.
Practical notes for visitors
- Main Sunday services fall between 9.30am and 11am; the larger evangelical churches run multiple gatherings, including evenings.
- The cathedral and St Marie's are two minutes apart in the city centre, both free to enter and open on weekdays.
- Supertram stops outside the cathedral; churches in Crookes, Broomhill and Ecclesall are on frequent bus routes from town.
- Sheffield's hills are real. Allow a little extra time if you are walking to church, especially west of the centre.
Frequently asked questions
What is Sheffield's oldest church?
The cathedral stands on Sheffield's oldest Christian site, with a churchyard cross fragment dating to the 9th century and medieval fabric in the present building. Among complete buildings, Upper Chapel of 1700 is the oldest Nonconformist survival.
Why is Sheffield known for new kinds of church?
A mix of cheap post-industrial space, two big universities and some unusually entrepreneurial church leaders made Sheffield a testing ground from the 1980s onwards. Models of small missional communities developed here now shape church planting across the world.