What M5 Closures Are There Tonight?
If you are driving the M5 overnight — heading down to the West Country, running freight to Avonmouth, or making an early start to miss the holiday traffic — this page shows the closures reported as affecting the motorway tonight.
Listed below: everything reported as affecting the M5 between 6pm and 6am, newest first. See all M5 traffic news »
17 matching items - showing 1-10 of 17 total available news items
M5 both directions Jct 27 to Jct 26 - HS & lane 1 & 2closure
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 northbound within J26
- Direction
- Both directions
- Lanes closed
- Lane closures
- Reason
- Maintenance work
- Schedule
- 20:45 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
M5 northbound Jct 26 to Jct 25 - lane closure 213/2-209/2
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 northbound between J26 and J25
- Direction
- Northbound
- Lanes closed
- Lane closures
- Reason
- Roadworks
- Schedule
- 20:02 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
M5 northbound Jct 14 entry slip road closure
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 J14 northbound access
- Direction
- Northbound
- Lanes closed
- Carriageway closed
- Reason
- Other
- Schedule
- 19:50 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
M5 northbound Jct 14 exit slip road closure
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 J14 northbound exit
- Direction
- Northbound
- Lanes closed
- Carriageway closed
- Reason
- Other
- Schedule
- 19:50 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
M5 southbound Jct 20 to Jct 21 single lane running (160/4 to 167/4)
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 southbound between J21 and J22
- Direction
- Southbound
- Lanes closed
- Restriction
- Reason
- Road improvement or upgrading
- Schedule
- 21:00 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
Hardshoulder closure
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 northbound between J21 and J20
- Direction
- Northbound
- Lanes closed
- Hard shoulder closed
- Reason
- Maintenance work
- Schedule
- 06:00 Tue 31 Dec 2024 → 06:00 Sat 19 Sept 2026
M5 Northbound Jct 31 to 30 lane 1, 2 closure 259/6b - 256/8b
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 northbound between J31 and J30
- Direction
- Northbound
- Lanes closed
- Lane closures
- Reason
- Construction work
- Schedule
- 20:00 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
Forecast - not confirmed
M5 northbound Jct 22 to Jct 21 single lane running (167/4 to 161/4)
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 northbound between J22 and J21
- Direction
- Northbound
- Lanes closed
- Restriction
- Reason
- Road improvement or upgrading
- Schedule
- 21:00 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
Forecast - not confirmed
M5 both directions Jct 27 to Jct 26 - HS & lane 1 & 2closure
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 northbound between J27 and J26
- Direction
- Both directions
- Lanes closed
- Lane closures
- Reason
- Maintenance work
- Schedule
- 21:00 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
Forecast - not confirmed
M5 both directions Jct 27 to Jct 26 - HS & lane 1 & 2closure
23:3816 Sept 2026reported 23 min ago
- Location
- M5 northbound between J27 and J26
- Direction
- Both directions
- Lanes closed
- Lane closures
- Reason
- Maintenance work
- Schedule
- 21:00 Wed 16 Sept 2026 → 06:00 Thu 17 Sept 2026
Forecast - not confirmed
Updated 00:02 Thu 17 Sept 2026
Powered by National Highways’ Transport Data Feeds.
What usually closes a motorway overnight
Most overnight closures are planned, and most are one of a handful of things:
- Resurfacing — new road surface, almost always done at night.
- Overnight closure — a section shut completely, with a signed diversion.
- Lane closures — one or more lanes shut, traffic still moving.
- Contraflow — traffic running on the opposite carriageway.
- Road marking and road maintenance — shorter works, often a single night.
- Abnormal load — an oversized load moved at night under escort, precisely because the road is quiet.
Those are the categories National Highways publishes in its traffic data, and the words are theirs, not ours.
If nothing is showing
An empty page is good news, not a broken one. It means there are no closures we are aware of affecting the M5 tonight. Because works are sometimes added late, cancelled without the record being updated, or never published at all, that is not a guarantee of a clear run — but it is the best picture available, and it is the same picture the official sources have. Everything currently reported on the M5, day and night together, is on our latest M5 traffic news page.
The overnight M5 and the holiday run
The M5 is the road the South West travels on, and a great deal of that travel is deliberately done at night. Drivers heading for Devon and Cornwall have set off at midnight to miss the queues for as long as there has been an M5, and hauliers serving Avonmouth and Exeter run the same hours.
Which makes the overnight closures worth checking rather than assuming. The stretch that carries most traffic, Junction 6 to Junction 5 near Worcester, takes 150,612 vehicles a day — and when a section of that is shut at 1am, the diversion is usually a long one.