A bedsit is a single room you rent to sleep, live and usually cook in, while sharing a bathroom or toilet with other tenants in the same building. That shared facility is what makes it a bedsit rather than a studio: a studio flat is self-contained, with its own kitchen, bathroom and toilet behind your own front door. ‘Bedsit’ is not a term defined in law, but the law draws the same line: a home counts as a self-contained flat only if a toilet, washing facilities and cooking facilities are all for the occupants’ exclusive use (Housing Act 2004, section 254).
This guide covers renting a bedsit in London under the law in England: how it differs from a studio or a room in a flatshare, what it costs, the rules that protect you, and what to check before you sign.
Bedsit, studio or room in a shared flat?
| Bedsit | Studio flat | Room in a shared flat or house | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Your own space | One room for sleeping and living, often with a small kitchen area | A whole self-contained flat, usually one main room | A bedroom |
| Kitchen | Often in your room; sometimes shared | Your own | Shared |
| Bathroom and toilet | Shared, or some facilities shared | Your own | Shared |
| Living room | Your room is the living room | Your room is the living room | Often a shared lounge |
| Usually part of an HMO? | Yes, if the building has 3 or more tenants from more than one household | Not usually | Yes, if 3 or more tenants from more than one household |
In practice the lines blur, and adverts use the words loosely. Some ‘studios’ have a shared bathroom down the corridor, which makes them bedsits in all but name; some bedsits have a private shower room but a shared kitchen. Ask exactly what is shared, and with how many people, before you view.
What a bedsit costs in London
No official statistics track bedsit rents. The ONS publishes London rents by number of bedrooms, not for bedsits or studios, and the average rent for a one-bedroom home in London was £1,760 a month in August 2026 (ONS Price Index of Private Rents). The closest published figure for shared accommodation is SpareRoom’s: the average advertised room in London cost £915 a month in the second quarter of 2026, with bills included, £979 in inner London and £794 in outer London (SpareRoom Rental Index).
No published figures show where bedsit rents fall between those two, so compare the total monthly cost of each option in the same area: a bedsit gives you your own cooking space but not your own bathroom. Check what the rent includes. Because a building of bedsits is usually an HMO, the landlord, not you, is normally liable for council tax, and the building is banded as one home, so council tax is often built into the rent (Council Tax (Liability for Owners) Regulations 1992; Council Tax (Chargeable Dwellings) Order 1992, article 3C). Energy, water and internet may be included too; get it in writing.
Adverts don’t use one label for bedsits, so search for ‘bedsit’, ‘studio with shared bathroom’ and ‘room with kitchenette’, and compare the total monthly cost with a room in a shared flat and a studio in the same area. Each borough’s average rents are on the London Rent Index on FTR London.
The rules that protect you in a bedsit
Your tenancy
If your landlord doesn’t live in the building, a bedsit tenancy is almost always an assured periodic tenancy, whether it began on or after 1 May 2026 or earlier (older tenancies converted on that date), with no fixed end date: you can leave with two months’ notice (an agreement from before 1 May 2026 may allow less), your rent can rise only once a year through a Form 4A notice, and the landlord needs a legal ground to end it (GOV.UK: assured periodic tenancies). If your landlord lives in the same home, you are a lodger, with fewer protections, and if they live elsewhere in the same converted house your tenancy isn’t an assured periodic tenancy either (Housing Act 1988, Schedule 1); see Shelter’s guidance for lodgers. With an assured periodic tenancy, the deposit is capped at five weeks’ rent (where the rent is under £50,000 a year) and must be protected in a government scheme within 30 days, and the landlord can’t take any rent before you sign. A lodger’s deposit is also capped at five weeks’ rent under the Tenant Fees Act 2019, but it doesn’t have to go into a protection scheme.
HMO licensing
A building of bedsits where three or more tenants from more than one household share a toilet, bathroom or kitchen is a house in multiple occupation. If five or more people live there, the landlord needs a mandatory HMO licence from the council, and many London boroughs also license smaller HMOs (GOV.UK: HMO licence). Renting out an unlicensed HMO can lead to an unlimited fine, and tenants can apply for a rent repayment order to get rent back. Our guide to HMO licensing in London explains the schemes and how to check.
Minimum room sizes
In a licensed HMO, a room used for sleeping by one person over 10 must be at least 6.51 square metres, and by two people over 10 at least 10.22 square metres, and floor space under a ceiling lower than 1.5 metres doesn’t count. These rules have applied since 1 October 2018 (Licensing of HMOs (Mandatory Conditions of Licences) Regulations 2018). A bedsit you also cook and live in should be comfortably bigger than that minimum.
Safety
If you’re a tenant rather than a lodger, your landlord must (a lodger’s landlord still has the gas duty, but the electrical and alarm rules don’t cover lodgers):
- have any gas appliances checked by a Gas Safe engineer every year, and give you a copy of the record before you move in (HSE);
- have the electrics inspected at least every five years, and give you the report (Electrical Safety Standards Regulations 2020);
- fit a smoke alarm on every storey with living accommodation, and a carbon monoxide alarm in any room with a fixed fuel-burning appliance other than a gas cooker, working on the day you move in;
- in an HMO, keep the shared areas and facilities in good repair and safe.
Fire safety matters most in a bedsit, where people cook in the room they sleep in. Check the fire doors close properly, the escape route is clear and the alarms work.
What to check before you rent a bedsit
- What exactly is shared (toilet, shower, kitchen), and with how many people.
- Whether the building needs an HMO licence and has one: ask the landlord, or check with the council.
- What the rent includes: council tax, energy, water, internet.
- The gas safety record, the electrical report and working alarms.
- Whether the landlord lives in the building, which decides whether you have an assured periodic tenancy or the weaker rights of a lodger or a resident landlord’s tenant.
- The size of the room against the legal minimum, measured without the areas under a low ceiling.
Is a bedsit right for you?
A bedsit suits someone who wants their own room and cooking space without renting a whole self-contained flat, and who doesn’t mind sharing a bathroom: people new to London, on a tight budget, or who want privacy without the social side of a flatshare. It suits people less well if they work from home in the same small room all day, or want a lounge to share with others. Compare it against a room in a flatshare, where you share more, in our guide to renting alone or sharing, and against a self-contained studio flat.
Browse rooms in shared flats and studio flats to rent across London. On FTR London, landlords list their homes themselves and you contact them directly, so you can ask what’s shared before you view.
Landlords letting bedsits: say clearly in the advert what is shared and whether the property is licensed, and list it on FTR London.
How we researched this: definitions from the Housing Act 2004; licensing, room sizes and safety duties from GOV.UK, HSE and legislation.gov.uk; tenancy rules from GOV.UK’s guidance on assured periodic tenancies; rents from the ONS Price Index of Private Rents (August 2026) and SpareRoom (Q2 2026). Checked on 24 September 2026.
Correction, 24 September 2026: this guide was rewritten. Earlier versions described a bedsit as self-contained, gave bedsit rent ranges and borough recommendations without a source, dated the HMO minimum room sizes to 2019 rather than October 2018, and did not reflect the tenancy rules in force since 1 May 2026.
