Top universities in UK for Theoretical Physics?

The usual.

Durham and Bristol are superb.

London Met and Cambridge are obviously the natural choices.

Warwick also has an excellent theoretical physics programme.

London Metropolitan ? what ???!!?!?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/table/2010/jun/04/university-guide-physics

I dont know how accurate that guide is, with Royal Holloway at 2nd and no sign of Cambridge!

London Metropolitan has a world-leading Physics department mate.

SUSSEX is quite good

I am thinking of doing a course in Physics/Physics with Theoretical Physics at university and have some questions:

What are the top universities for Theoretical Physics?
How much maths is there? i.e. is it just further maths a-level carried on?

How much maths?

More maths than a degree in maths.

How much maths?

More maths than a degree in maths.

1. Cambridge; The natural sciences course, you specialise as you progress but certainly don't miss out on anything.
2. Imperial; Physics course, specialise later
3. Durham;
4. Warwick

after that, kind of subjective, do some research or base it on the uni you like most.

How much maths?

LOTS

it's further maths a-level carried on, but carried on for a long way. Much more rigorous as well. You wont meet anything that is entirely 100% a new area of maths, that hasn't been mentioned before, but it all goes a lot further.

I'd prob say Imperial edges it but I am biased as i'm talking about my own course.

Pros of Cambridge Nat-Sci would be the tutorial system which is obviously a game changer if you respond well to supervised learning. But not everyone does for instance I never responded well to being told how to do things!

Also another pro is the ability to switch degree courses which is good individually and arguably helps produce happier and more academically satisfied grads.

Pros of Imperial Theo Phys would be more maths. We do an analysis course in 1st year with proof, lemmas, epsilons etc (which I havent heard of elsewhere) a methods course in 2nd year and an advanced classical physics course in 3rd year plus standard maths courses on top.

Another thing would be the range of options you can take. Probably something like 30 options over 2 years which you choose 10 plus a lot of theory 1s. so theres really a lot of choice and flexibility.

Lastly I believe our research output in the field is No1(don't quote me on that) so that would obviously help if you were looking to get really get stuck into academia.

Also I heard Durham and St Andrews are decent. but dont go to UCL. Poor quality physics there

You haven't understood the supervision system, it's not supervised learning, it's detailed teaching in areas you want help getting a better grasp of and stretching your knowledge in areas you're good at.

There's no cons to the system, apart from the amount of academics time it takes up.

Additionally, you're being taught 2-1 with real academics. My supervisor every so often has to take a week out to go to CERN. That knowledge feeds back.