National rank
19 of 30
18 towns model higher than this one.
Birmingham is the highest of the 3 West Midlands towns we cover.
£186 a day, and 18 towns in the country model higher.
Modelled from two published statistics, West Midlands median weekly pay of £730.40 and Birmingham housing at £236,000, both sourced 5 July 2026 and cross checked further down this page.
How Birmingham compares with the other 29
30 towns, one axis. Birmingham is the marked tick, at £186 on a rail running from £160 in Sunderland up to £235 in Guildford, which puts it £14 below the drawn £200 benchmark.
Birmingham £186
£200 benchmark
Birmingham sits £49 under Guildford at the top and £26 over Sunderland at the bottom.
Birmingham's marker is the decorator rate.
It is the trade the model anchors on, and the other 16 move with the same multiplier, from £130 for general labourer work to £260 for electrician work.
Regional rank
1 of 3
Against the 3 towns we model in the West Midlands.
Versus benchmark
£14 down
7.0 percent below the £200 national decorator benchmark.
What 17 trades charge in Birmingham
17 trades, one town. A Birmingham day runs from £130 for general labourer up to £260 for electrician, which is a £130 span on what is otherwise the same working day, priced through West Midlands earnings.
Every one of the 17 is the same 7 percent down on Birmingham geography, because one multiplier built from the West Midlands pay and Birmingham house prices moves all of them together.
| Trade | Day rate | Modelled range |
|---|---|---|
| Electrician£20 below the £280 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £260 | |
| Plumber£20 below the £270 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £250 | |
| Bricklayer£19 below the £260 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £241 | |
| Gas and Heating Engineer£19 below the £259 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £240 | |
| General Builder£18 below the £253 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £235 | |
| Carpenter and joiner£17 below the £240 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £223 | |
| Roofer£17 below the £239 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £222 | |
| Plasterer£17 below the £230 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £213 | |
| Tiler£17 below the £229 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £212 | |
| Drainage Engineer£16 below the £225 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £209 | |
| Decorative Plasterer£16 below the £225 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £209 | |
| GroundworkerModelled only£15 below the £213 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £198 | |
| Painter and decorator£14 below the £200 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £186 | |
| Handyman£14 below the £188 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £174 | |
| Cladding Installer£13 below the £175 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £162 | |
| Suspended Ceiling Installer£13 below the £175 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £162 | |
| General Labourer£10 below the £140 benchmark on Birmingham geography. | £130 |
Heads upEvery benchmark is a modelled estimate published beside the spread the price guides themselves publish, and is never the median of a directory.Each row above says what Birmingham does to that trade.The day rate ranges the price guides publish are national, so they sit on each trade's own page rather than being reprinted on all 30 town pages.Follow any Birmingham row to read them.
Scale every bar drawn on £110 to £440Bar the modelled range, the rate x 0.75 and x 1.30No spread 1 of the 17 rows, marked MODELLED ONLY, where no UK price guide publishes a comparable day rate
Your next step
You have what 17 trades charge in Birmingham, so the next step is pricing one of your own jobs there.
The Rate Sorted calculator opens already set to Birmingham, so your own costs go in and a Birmingham rate you can quote with comes out.
How long the work takes in Birmingham
A rate prices a day and a job takes several of them. This site publishes a length for 3 of the 17 trades above, so those 3 Birmingham rates can be multiplied out.
A decorating job in Birmingham comes to £372 to £744, on the 19th dearest day rate of the 30 towns on this site.
decorating in Birmingham
£372 to £744
A painter and decorator day in Birmingham models at £186, and decorating a living room takes 2 to 4 days.Source: Robin Gofton, Decorator's Forum UK, job reports.How long does decorating take?
plastering in Birmingham
£234 to £362
A plasterer day in Birmingham models at £213, and skimming 35 square metres of wall and a 16 square metre ceiling takes 1.1 to 1.7 days.Source: Methvin plastering production rates, updated 1 August 2026, fast to slow.How long does plastering take?
tiling in Birmingham
£530 to £678
A tiler day in Birmingham models at £212, and fixing and grouting 20 square metres of bathroom wall takes 2.5 to 3.2 days.Source: Methvin tiling production rates, updated 1 August 2026, fast to slow.How long does tiling take?
Read the sumEach figure above is a Birmingham day rate multiplied by a job length, and Day rate or price per job? is where that sum is worked in full.It is our arithmetic rather than a price anybody quoted, and none of the 3 lengths is a Birmingham measurement.
Why Birmingham prices as it does
Birmingham carries West Midlands prices without West Midlands being the reason.
£236,000
The average house price, against £291,000 across the UK.
£730.40
The West Midlands median weekly pay Birmingham is modelled on, 4.7 percent below the UK median of £766.60.
0.81x
Property against the UK average, 19 percent below it.
ONS local housing prices, April 2026 provisional, UK House Price Index.
Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) April 2025 regional medians.
Registers sourced 5 July 2026.
How Birmingham stands on the two cross checks
Both are published statistics. Neither sets a rate on this page, and neither is a survey of what anyone in Birmingham charged for a day of work; what they show is why Birmingham lands where it does.
West Midlands WEEKLY PAY
£730.40
Birmingham is modelled on the West Midlands median for full time work, according to ONS ASHE April 2025.It is 4.7 percent below the UK median of £766.60 a week, and Birmingham models at £186 a decorator day on it.West Midlands ranks 6 of the 11 regions on the register, and Birmingham is 1 of the 3 West Midlands towns we model on it.
Birmingham HOUSE PRICES
£236,000
The Birmingham average, data from the ONS local housing price pages, April 2026 provisional.That is 0.81 times the UK average of £291,000, per the UK House Price Index.17 of the 30 towns we cover have more expensive housing.
Birmingham questions
The same answers the structured data on this page gives a search engine, word for word, and every figure in them is a Birmingham figure printed above.
What is a typical day rate in Birmingham?
A decorator day in Birmingham models at £186.
That is number 19 of the 30 towns on this site.
Across the 17 trades a Birmingham day runs from £130 for general labourer work up to £260 for electrician work, every one of them modelled on West Midlands earnings and Birmingham house prices.
Which trade charges the most per day in Birmingham?
Electrician, at £260 a day.
General Labourer work is the cheapest of the 17, at £130.
That leaves a £130 span for the same working day in the same town, and it happens because every trade carries its own national benchmark before any Birmingham geography is applied to it.
Is Birmingham dearer than Coventry?
Birmingham is the dearer of the two: £186 in Birmingham against £182 in Coventry, a £4 gap on a decorator day.
Birmingham and Coventry both sit in the West Midlands.
Birmingham ranks 1 of the 3 towns we model there.
Why are Birmingham rates below the national benchmark?
Two published statistics move the Birmingham figure: West Midlands median weekly pay of £730.40, 6 of the 11 regions on the register, and a local average house price of £236,000, 18 of the 30 towns.
Together they put Birmingham £14 under the £200 national decorator benchmark.
That is 7.0 percent down.
Can I use these Birmingham figures as a quote?
No. £186 is a modelled town figure, and the modelled range beside it, £140 to £242, is arithmetic on that figure rather than a measurement of Birmingham jobs.
16 of the 17 Birmingham rows carry a spread that UK price guides publish nationally, on the trade's own page, and 1 are modelled with none.
Take the data
17 Birmingham rows, £130 to £260. Each row carries its own provenance, so a modelled Birmingham figure can never be read as a sourced one.
Download · CSVbirmingham.csvOne row per trade, with the rate, the modelled range and the published spread.
Cite this pageThe Day Rate Report, Birmingham day rates, 30 September 2026, https://thedayrate.co.uk/day-rates/birmingham/
Embed this figure
The Birmingham card carries the decorator rate and the date it was sourced, and the link goes to this page.
<a href="https://thedayrate.co.uk/day-rates/birmingham/"><img src="https://thedayrate.co.uk/og/day-rates-birmingham.png" alt="Day rates for 17 trades in Birmingham, from The Day Rate Report" width="1200" height="630"></a>
The Birmingham figures are free to use in an article, a fact check or a local story, and a credit with a link back is all we ask, under CC BY 4.0.