How bad is the Northern Line at rush hour? (From Clapham)

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We are moving from Notting Hill to a new area of London. Considering Clapham South or Balham areas.

Our commute is to Moorgate/Liverpool Street. We need to get in for 9am.

Just how bad is the tube for rush hour in the mornings from Clapham? If it's really dreadful we'll look somewhere more central or a walk away.

Pretty grim to be honest. People get on the tube from overground at Balham. Eases off at Stockwell but the three Clapham stations are a bun fight.

It's pretty bad on Tuesday/ Wednesday/ Thursday, yes.

Try it for yourself a couple of times. Get out the house one day at 7am, get over to Balham/Clapham, have a quick flat white and an avocado toast for breakfast in one of the many charming little cafes, and then (try to) get on the tube heading north at 8:15.

I lived in Clapham in 1995 and tbh it was bad then on the tube. I used to walk to Brixton and get the tube from there - as the start of the line I could always get a seat

It is pretty bad, I used to commute up it earlier eg 6.45am and it was ok at that time. Whenever I had to get it at normal rush hour it would be horrible.
I'd recommend looking along the Thameslink route, eg Herne Hill to Blackfriars or Farringdon instead- much nicer!

Herne Hill's not a bad shout. Nice area, and the trains are quick, though still crowded, and obviously not as frequent as tubes.

Grim! I had to get it the other day at that time from Clapham North to Kennington and waited for 20 mins at the station for about 8 trains to go past before I could finally squeeze onto a train. I had the pleasure of stooping under someone's armpit the whole way.
Would avoid rush hour on the southern end of the main northern line at all costs. The Battersea branch might be better or echo someone else suggestion of Herne hill / Tulse Hill / Streatham and getting the Thameslink train to Farringdon or City Thameslink.

It was awful pre covid - really awful. I used to get in for 9.30 (also Moorgate) which was pretty busy and anything before that was horrible. Things eased off a lot in the post covid wfh era but now are ramping back up again to much the same level except for Mondays and Fridays.

Have to be honest, if you are tied to a commute to Moorgate/Liverpool Street for 9am and it’s daily or most days, I might look elsewhere. I didn’t realise how much the commute was taking out of me until I stopped.

I used to live in Highbury and had a lovely commute on the overground from Drayton Park train station.

I used to do this commute over 10 years ago and it wasn't great, pretty crowded in the mornings, but i reckon it would be quicker than the x-London commute from Notting Hill and not that much more crowded. I cycle to work these days and if I had to do that commute again id cycle it mpst days even though it's quite a bit further than my current cycle commute. cycling in london has got so much nicer in the last 6-7 years or so with all the infrastucture

From Clapham South, it's still do-able (it's not as bad as it was before covid)

But Clapham Common and Clapham North both have a central platform, and it's awful and I'd avoid from about 7:30 to 9:00 unless it was imperative I travelled then (I'd go earlier and have coffee near destination if I could plan ahead). The layout of the platform in those two stations feels like a disaster waiting to happen.

Clapham North and Clapham Common are bad. I usually take the bus to Stockwell, where lots will get off the Northern Line and transfer to the Victoria Line. It’s easier to get on there. The further south you go on the Northern Line, the easier it is to get on