How much does a new kitchen cost in the UK?

Understanding kitchen renovation costs

A kitchen is the single most expensive room most homeowners will ever renovate. Our UK cost model puts a typical Mid-range refit at around £13,500, with Budget installs from £5,000 and Premium bespoke kitchens well past £40,000. The spread is wide because the job stacks up fast: units, worktops, appliances, tiling, flooring, lighting, plumbing, gas, electrics, plastering, and decorating, all coordinated around a room the household still needs to use. This page breaks down the five decisions that move the number most, and flags the line items that quotes often leave vague. If you’re already holding a quote, read this with it in one hand. You’ll spot what’s missing faster than you think.

How layout shapes the budget before you’ve chosen anything

Layout is the first cost lever, not the last. A galley kitchen in a flat, with units on one or two walls, is the cheapest shape to fit: short plumbing runs, minimal worktop linear metres, no corner cabinetry to fudge. An L-shape is the next step up and the most common layout in UK semis, balancing worktop length with walkable floor space. A U-shape adds another run of units and usually another metre or two of worktop, so materials jump 15 to 25%. An island is the biggest single jump: it needs its own electrics (often a double socket and extractor feed), sometimes a waste and water run under the floor, and a separate worktop slab that’s more expensive per linear metre than a wall run. Budget an extra £2,000 to £5,000 for the island itself before you’ve chosen a stool.

Units: flat-pack, rigid, or bespoke

This is where most of the unit spend decision sits. Flat-pack from IKEA, Wickes, or Howdens trade counters runs £2,000 to £5,000 for the cabinetry in a typical 10 to 14 m² kitchen. Rigid (pre-assembled) ranges from Howdens, Magnet, or Benchmarx are usually £4,000 to £9,000 and go in faster on site, which lowers fitter time. Bespoke cabinetmakers start around £12,000 and have no upper limit: paint-grade in-frame shaker in tulipwood is £18,000 to £30,000 for the same footprint. Flat-pack is a sensible choice for Budget and Mid-range tiers if the fitter is experienced with the brand. Bespoke earns its premium in awkward rooms (Victorian chimney breasts, sloping ceilings, non-standard widths) where off-the-shelf carcases waste floor space.

Worktops: the quiet half of the spec

Worktop choice is often where homeowners over- or under-spend. Laminate is £40 to £90 per linear metre and looks considerably better than it used to, especially in matt woodgrain finishes. Solid wood (oak, beech, iroko) is £100 to £250 per linear metre, but needs oiling every six months and doesn’t love the area around a sink. Quartz is the mid-to-premium workhorse at £250 to £500 per linear metre installed, including templating and fitting. Granite sits similar to quartz but varies more by slab. Porcelain and sintered stone (Dekton, Neolith) push past £600 per linear metre but tolerate heat and stains better than anything else. For a typical L-shape with 6 linear metres of worktop, that’s the difference between £400 on laminate and £3,600 on Dekton.

Appliances: freestanding vs integrated

Integrated appliances cost 10 to 20% more than their freestanding equivalents for the same spec, and require unit doors and fascias to match. That’s often forgotten in early quotes. A freestanding Bosch Series 4 oven is around £450; the integrated equivalent with a matching cabinet door adds £150 to £300 to the spend. Fridge-freezers show the biggest gap: a freestanding mid-range unit is £500 to £800, an integrated one sized to a standard 1,770mm tall housing is £900 to £1,400. Integrated looks cleaner and adds resale value on higher-spec properties. Freestanding gives flexibility if you move house and want to take appliances with you. It’s a resale-versus-flexibility call, not a quality one.

Why labour eats more of the budget than people expect

On a full kitchen refit, labour typically lands between 30 and 45% of the total. A fitter’s day rate is £200 to £400 in most of the UK and £350 to £500 in London and the South East. A full strip-out, electrics first fix, plumbing, plastering, flooring, unit install, worktop templating and fitting (a two-week gap is normal for quartz or granite), tiling, appliance install, second fix, and snagging is usually ten to twenty working days. If a quote is weighted heavily toward units and light on labour, that’s worth a question. So is a quote that doesn’t name which trades are included. A kitchen fitter rarely does their own gas work or Part P electrics, and a quote that doesn’t show a gas-safe engineer and a qualified electrician is either subcontracting silently or missing scope.

What’s typically missed from a kitchen quote: making good after the old kitchen comes out (plastering, skimming), electrical certification (Part P), gas certification (Gas Safe), waste removal and skip hire, worktop templating and the two-week wait, final snag and silicone. Ask for these in writing.

A note on quote validation

Three quotes is the UK standard for good reason. Across 5 linear metres of worktop, two fitters, and a mid-range appliance package, we regularly see a £6,000 spread between the cheapest and most expensive quote for the same room. Cheap isn’t always bad, and expensive isn’t always padded. What matters is understanding the difference: is the cheap quote using flat-pack where the expensive one quoted rigid? Is one quoting quartz and the other laminate? Is labour being costed by the day or as a lump sum with no hours named? Line-item each quote against the same spec. If a fitter won’t itemise, that’s the answer.