How much does plastering cost in the UK?
Plastering costs £600 on average in the UK. Most jobs fall between £250 and £1,000 per room. Job type: Ceiling only £250 to £500; Skim one room £350 to £600; Full re-plaster one room £500 to £1,000. Prices reviewed June 2026.
Plastering cost calculator
Use the calculator to price your plastering in 2026. Adjust the options and area for a UK cost range. Nothing is sent anywhere.
Plastering is usually priced by the room. Skimming over sound walls is cheapest, and hacking off old plaster and starting again costs more.
Room, ceiling or skim: choose the same scope
A ceiling-only job is £250 to £500, a room skim £350 to £600, and a full room replaster £500 to £1,000 in this guide. Confirm the measured walls and ceiling included in each quote. A skim assumes a sound surface; removal or overboarding is a different job.
Where removal is needed, ask whether it is already included in the full-replaster price before adding the separate £150 to £400 allowance. The surface-measurement example below helps compare rooms of different sizes.
Need to know how much material to order? Try the plasterboard calculator or paint calculator.
Plastering cost breakdown
Typical plastering costs, by option:
| Job type | Typical UK cost |
|---|---|
| Ceiling only | £250 to £500 |
| Skim one room | £350 to £600 |
| Full re-plaster one room | £500 to £1,000 |
| + Hack off old plaster first | add £150 to £400 |
What's included in the price?
Typical plastering prices include:
- Preparing and protecting the room
- The agreed walls and/or ceiling for the selected job; confirm the measured area
- Materials
- Cleaning up and removing waste
What changes the price?
The things that move plastering prices most:
Room size and how many walls and ceilings
Skim over existing plaster versus a full re-plaster
Whether old plaster needs hacking off first
Access, height and any repairs to the wall behind
How the price is built up
The selected job sets the allowance: a ceiling only is £250 to £500, skimming a room over sound plaster is £350 to £600, and replastering onto prepared backing is £500 to £1,000. The replastering tier excludes hacking off old plaster. Select the £150 to £400 removal option if needed, giving £650 to £1,400 combined. The room bands are broad planning allowances, not a promise to cover any room size; confirm wall area, ceiling inclusion and preparation before comparing quotes. Plastering is mostly labour. On a typical room the plasterer's time is roughly 80 to 85 percent of the cost, with plaster, beading and sundries making up the small remainder.
Measure the surfaces before comparing room prices
A 4 m by 3 m room has a 14 m perimeter. At 2.4 m high, its walls cover 33.6 m² before openings. If doors and windows occupy 4 m², the net walls are 29.6 m². The ceiling adds 12 m², so walls and ceiling together are 41.6 m². This is a measurement example, not the room size assumed by every plasterer.
Ask each firm to price the same 29.6 m² of walls, or the same 41.6 m² including the ceiling. State whether surfaces are sound, need local repairs or must be stripped. Reveals, corners, protection and cleanup take time even where openings reduce the area.
For a small patch, setup and travel can dominate the bill. Dividing a minimum charge by a tiny area produces a high per-m² figure without making the quote unreasonable. Ask whether adjoining repairs can be included in the same visit.
Ways to keep the cost down
- A skim over existing plaster keeps you in the £350 to £600 band instead of the £500 to £1000 full re-plaster band, so if the walls are sound rather than blown, ask for a skim and stay in the cheaper band.
- Get the old plaster off yourself before the plasterer starts. Hacking off is charged as an extra £150 to £400, and on plain plaster it is unskilled work you can do with a bolster and a skip. One exception matters: if the surface is a textured coating of the artex kind and the house predates 2000, get it tested before you touch it. Those coatings often contain asbestos, and breaking one up dry is exactly how the fibres get into the air.
- Book connecting rooms, or a ceiling and walls together, in one visit. A plasterer already set up and mixing on site will quote the whole lot keener than two separate call-outs.
- Have the room cleared and sheeted before the plasterer arrives so none of the day is spent moving furniture, which keeps the labour time you pay for down.
Does where you live change the cost?
In London, plastering typically costs around £720 per room, about 20% above the UK average of £600. In the North, Scotland and Wales the guide figure is nearer £580.
| Region | From | Typical | Up to |
|---|---|---|---|
| Midlands / East (UK average) | £250 | £600 | £1,000 |
| London | £300 | £720 | £1,200 |
| South East / South West | £260 | £630 | £1,100 |
| North / Scotland / Wales | £240 | £580 | £970 |
Guide prices per room, scaled with the same regional multipliers as the calculator. Not quotes.
Plastering cost in major UK cities
| City | From | Typical | Up to |
|---|---|---|---|
| Belfast | £240 | £570 | £950 |
| Birmingham | £250 | £600 | £1,000 |
| Bristol | £260 | £630 | £1,100 |
| Cardiff | £240 | £580 | £970 |
| Edinburgh | £240 | £580 | £970 |
| Glasgow | £240 | £580 | £970 |
| Leeds | £240 | £580 | £970 |
| Liverpool | £240 | £580 | £970 |
| London | £300 | £720 | £1,200 |
| Manchester | £240 | £580 | £970 |
| Newcastle | £240 | £580 | £970 |
| Sheffield | £240 | £580 | £970 |
City guide estimates, scaled by local labour costs. Indicative averages for plastering, not quotes.
Nearly all of the regional gap is labour. In London and the South East, expect to pay more, mainly on the plasterer's day rate.
Common questions
How much does it cost to plaster a room?
The guide allows £350 to £600 to skim a room over sound plaster, or £500 to £1,000 for replastering the prepared backing. Removing old plaster is a separate £150 to £400 option, making replastering with removal £650 to £1,400. Room dimensions, ceiling inclusion and condition must be confirmed in the quote.
Is skimming cheaper than re-plastering?
Yes. Skimming puts a thin fresh coat over walls that are still sound, so it is quicker and cheaper than removing the old plaster and starting from the brick.
How much to plaster a ceiling?
A ceiling on its own usually costs around £250 to £500 depending on the size and whether it is being skimmed or boarded and plastered first.
How much do plasterers charge per day?
Most UK plasterers price by the job, but the day rate underneath is typically £150 to £250 plus materials. That is why a one-room skim lands at £350 to £600: it is about a day of work with materials and setup. Very small patch jobs still carry a minimum charge, so bundling rooms together gets better value.
How much does it cost to plaster a whole house?
Skimming every room of a typical 3 bed house usually comes to £3,000 to £6,000, depending on how many rooms and ceilings are included and how much making good is needed. If old plaster has to come off first, add £150 to £400 per room and expect a full re-plaster to run £500 to £1,000 per room instead.
How much do plasterers charge per square metre?
A square-metre comparison needs the plastered surface area, not the floor area. For example, a 4 m by 3 m room with 2.4 m walls has 33.6 m² of wall before openings; deduct 4 m² of doors and windows and add its 12 m² ceiling for 41.6 m². A £500 illustrative quote for that scope works out at about £12 per m². That is a derived example, not a rate to apply to every job: preparation, minimum charges and access change the price.
How long does it take to plaster a room?
Most single rooms are a one to two day job. A ceiling only, or a straight skim over sound plaster in the £350 to £600 band, is often done in a day. A full re-plaster in the £500 to £1000 band takes longer because each coat has to go off before the next, and hacking off blown plaster first, the £150 to £400 add-on, adds time before any new plaster is applied. Plaster then needs several days to dry before you paint.
Do plasterers charge more for a ceiling than a wall?
Ceilings are priced on their own here at £250 to £500, and per square metre they are usually the fiddlier work because it is all done overhead. Even so, a ceiling only is often the cheapest single job on this page, sitting below a full room re-plaster. If a ceiling is part of a wider re-plaster it is folded into the room total rather than added separately, and awkward access or height can push the price toward the top of the band.
Can I plaster a room myself?
You can, and since plastering is roughly 80 to 85 percent labour you would save most of the £350 to £1,000 per room cost, leaving just plaster and beading. The catch is that skimming a flat, smooth finish is a real skill that takes practice. Beginners often get a rippled or patchy wall that needs sanding or redoing. Small patches are a fair first go; a whole room usually pays to hand to a plasterer.
Is replastering a room worth it?
Usually yes for your own comfort, less so as an investment. At £350 to £1,000 per room, fresh plaster gives clean, flat walls that decorate well and hide old cracks and patches. It does not add much resale value on its own, but tired, blown or artexed walls put buyers off. Worth doing where the surface is genuinely poor, rather than over sound walls that only need filling.
How long does plaster last?
Plaster does not really have a service life, which is why quoted figures run from 15 years to over 100 and none of them help much. Lath and plaster in Victorian houses is routinely a century old and sound, while a poor skim can fail within a couple of years. Plaster fails from a cause rather than from age, and there are three: the bond goes, so it comes away from the wall and sounds hollow when tapped, which is what people mean by blown; damp keeps the wall wet so the plaster stays soft and crumbly; or the building moves and cracks it. That matters for what you pay, because a skim only works over a sound backing. Skim over blown plaster or an unfixed damp problem and it will fail again, so the honest answer is often the dearer full re-plaster, or fixing the damp first.
How long does plaster take to dry?
Fresh plaster is usually touch-dry within a few hours, but it needs longer to dry out fully before you paint it. A skim coat is normally ready to decorate in about 2 to 3 days in a warm, ventilated room, and a thicker backing or bonding coat can take up to a week. Wait until the whole surface has gone from dark patchy brown to an even pale pink, then paint it with a watered-down mist coat first.
Official guidance and sources
The rules and schemes referenced on this page come from these official UK sources. The price figures are Costwise's own; see how we price.
- Locations of asbestos HSE · Names textured decorative coatings on ceilings and walls among the asbestos materials found in buildings, which is why a pre-2000 artex surface is tested rather than hacked off.
Cite this data
These figures are free to use in articles, reports and research under a CC BY 4.0 licence. All we ask is a credit to Costwise, and online a link. Where your style allows, please make "Costwise" the linked word so readers can check the figure for their own region.
Costwise (2026): Plastering typically costs £600 per room in the UK, ranging from £250 to £1,000 per room. Reviewed June 2026. costwiseuk.co.ukSource: Costwise (costwiseuk.co.uk)Costwise (2026). Plastering cost. Costwise UK cost data, version 2026-10-23. https://costwiseuk.co.uk/plastering-cost/2026-10-23 (158 jobs)Dataset DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21159943 · also on Kaggle, Hugging Face and Figshare. Method: how we price. Downloadable CSV.
These are independent guide prices based on typical UK jobs in 2026. Your actual cost depends on your property, spec, access and where you live. Always get at least three written quotes before committing.