A guide to UK office costs

Since the intensity of use in office buildings varies it has become standard practice in the industry when looking at occupancy costs to measure not only price per sq ft but also costs per workstation. For organisations who use a 1:1 ratio for workstations (no desk sharing/hot desking) and staff, this measure also relates to cost per staff member.

Therefore a good best practice benchmark for the total workstation area is 100 sq ft (NIA). This is a reasonable assumption for an occupier moving into and refitting new space, although in practice some occupier sectors use considerably more space and some less.

The experience of the pandemic has accelerated shifting trends around office layouts and, in order to reflect this, key changes have been have been put into place relating to the breakdown of the space associated with a typical workstation, as set out below. The net area of a workstation* is the area taken up by a desk and a chair, with changes to the assumptions in the 2021 survey including the scaling down in the number of desk spaces from 500 to 350 in exchange for a greater amount and range of workspaces within the category for collaboration.

Source: LSH RESEARCH

Our space calculation continues to assume approximately 12% cellular space and 88% open plan.

The cost data has been supplied by Lambert Smith Hampton and a number of leading industry suppliers. The data in this edition represents the position as of June 2025.

To get consistent and comparable costs between locations, the type of building and associated day-to-day services have been specified in detail. For full information on the building's specification, see Definition of Cost Heads below.

Key building parameters:

• Provides 50,000 sq ft (NIA), built on four floors in a prime location. The construction includes a steel frame, curtain walling and raised floors.
• There are 500 individually allocated personal workspaces.
• Net effective rents are utilised rather than headline rents as these provide a more accurate reflection of actual costs inclusive of rent free incentives.
• The building is let on a 10-year FRI lease with a rent review after five years.
• The occupancy assessment also assumes good configuration efficiency with primary circulation totalling 20 per cent balance of NIA.
• Ancillary and amenity spaces such as reception, post handling, breakout space, meeting rooms and catering space make up approximately 15 per cent of the total space.