Urban societies are experiencing intensified social frictions which have manifested in a growing occurrence of riots. Urban riots are often treated as ephemeral outbursts which create only short-term or immediate responses by the state or residents. However, this paper aims to move beyond such present-centrism by proposing a research agenda for studying their contextually longer-term legacies. Particular consideration is given to three thematic areas: (a) policy responses, (b) temporalities and urban memory, and (c) feelings and subjectivities. Drawing upon empirical illustrations concerning riots in London (2011) and Stockholm (2013), the paper uncovers variations within and across the two cities, such as differing state and private sector interventions; reshaping of civil society; and how residents variously resist, adapt to, and promote change. The paper thus reflects upon how riots’ afterlives in different urban contexts are constructed, mobilized and contested. Such variations point to the importance of the situated study of urban riots’ diverse legacies.