Great Western Coffee Shop

My daughter is about to move to Cholsey. Any advice from seasoned commuters about best trains, chances of getting seat, advisability of changing at RDG etc? Thanks in advance.

I'm not a seasoned commuter but it might be worth checking whether it's quicker to drive to Didcot Parkway and make the journey from there - nearly all (if not all) trains from Cholsey heading towards Paddington are all stations as far as Reading, whereas in the morning/afternoon peaks there are frequent fast trains from Didcot.

I'm at Goring and don't travel to Paddington, but there is a HST service that arrives around 0730. Looking at the timetable it looks like the 0715 service from Didcot, calling at Cholsey, Goring, Pangbourne, Tilehurst, Maidenhead and Paddington - arriving 0826. Being the first stop from Didcot, seating shouldn't be a problem (there is always space at Goring), but it does tend to fill up at the following stations if the one time I used it is anything to go by!

To get there any quicker you are looking at changing at Reading I expect.

Season tickets from Cholsey to Paddington are the same price as from Reading and quite a bit cheaper than from Didcot (+parking). The direct HSTs are the ones to aim for, particularly in the morning.  Most journeys involve a change at Reading with a Cholsey to Reading service every 30 minutes or so.

To add to what 'lordgoata' and 'cholsey' have said, either the 06:40 or 07:21 are direct taking about an hour and formed of HST's - definitely no problem getting a seat there.  The other option is the 07:07 to Reading and change there.  Again no problem getting a seat to Reading, but it's a bit of a lottery from Reading to Paddington.

Coming back, if you get to Paddington in good time then there's no problem getting a seat, but you'll struggle on all the trains (with the possibe exception of the direct - but quite slow at 70 mins - HST at 17:33) if you arrive last minute. There are several 'change at Reading' options on the way home to cut the journey by a few minutes, though it's hard to take too much time off of the 17:18 and 18:18 Turbos at 58 minutes, mind you they're both packed until Maidenhead.