Meghan Markle will travel to the UK with her children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, but will no longer attend any public events alongside her husband, Prince Harry.
After a week of toing and froing, reports on Friday said the Duchess of Sussex, 44, will fly to the UK this week but has pulled out of the Invictus Games event in Birmingham.
The U-turn comes after it was announced at the start of the week that Meghan and her two children would not travel to London, as had originally been planned.
The duchess also pulled out of a scheduled appearance with Harry, 41, at the Royal Hospital Chelsea in London on Wednesday after they were denied taxpayer-funded police protection during their trip.
Under the new plans, it is unclear whether a meeting will take place between King Charles and his grandchildren Archie, seven, and Lilibet, five, who he has not seen in person for four years.
Royal experts have been critical of the Sussexes and the chaos surrounding the long-planned UK visit.
“They were always coming,” author Tom Sykes wrote on his The Royalist Substack on Friday.
“The tearful briefings about the trip being ‘pulled out from under their feet,’ the statements about protective security, the will-they-won’t-they melodrama stretched across three separate news cycles: Friday: they’re coming! Saturday: it’s all off! Monday: actually, hang on!
“None of it changed the arithmetic, which is that Meghan cannot afford, in the most literal sense of that word, not to come.”
Journalist Paula Froelich remarked that the family visit has to happen in order for the Sussexes to “keep some sort of significance”.
“Without the kids, King Charles would have stayed far, far away,” she said.
“Both Meghan and Harry desperately need to try and get in with the head Royal if only to try and keep some sort of significance in their adopted hometown of Montecito.”
Harry’s UK trip was intended to promote the Invictus Games 2027, which will be held in Birmingham next year, but it has been shrouded in chaos from the start.
Shortly before he arrived, the duke’s spokesperson announced he had accepted an invitation to stay at Buckingham Palace, only for the Palace to swiftly issue a counter-statement that the offer had been withdrawn.
Then, on Tuesday, Harry’s appearance at an Invictus event was overshadowed by his crushing court defeat against Daily Mail publishers, Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL).
The Duke of Sussex, along with six other high-profile figures, including Sir Elton John and Elizabeth Hurley, had every one of their 97 claims rejected by a judge after they accused journalists of unlawful information gathering.
Mr Justice Nicklin said the claimants failed to prove any of the allegations and accepted that every article in question was lawfully sourced.
In response to the verdict, Prince Harry issued a furious statement which branded the judgement a “complete and obvious whitewash”.
“We came to court seeking justice and accountability. But we have received neither,” he said in a joint statement with fellow claimant, Baroness Doreen Lawrence.