National rank
4 of 30
3 towns model higher than this one.
Brighton models £19 over the national decorator rate.
£219 a day, 4 of 30, and 3 of 7 in South East.
Modelled from two published statistics, South East median weekly pay of £775.80 and Brighton housing at £406,000, both sourced 5 July 2026 and cross checked further down this page.
How Brighton compares with the other 29
30 towns, one axis. Brighton is the marked tick, at £219 on a rail running from £160 in Sunderland up to £235 in Guildford, which puts it £19 above the drawn £200 benchmark.
Brighton £219
£200 benchmark
Brighton sits £16 under Guildford at the top and £59 over Sunderland at the bottom.
Brighton's marker is the decorator rate.
It is the trade the model anchors on, and the other 16 move with the same multiplier, from £153 for general labourer work to £307 for electrician work.
Regional rank
3 of 7
Against the 7 towns we model in the South East.
Versus benchmark
£19 up
9.5 percent above the £200 national decorator benchmark.
What 17 trades charge in Brighton
17 trades, one town. A Brighton day runs from £153 for general labourer up to £307 for electrician, which is a £154 span on what is otherwise the same working day, priced through South East earnings.
Every one of the 17 is the same 9 to 10 percent up on Brighton geography, because one multiplier built from the South East pay and Brighton house prices moves all of them together.
| Trade | Day rate | Modelled range |
|---|---|---|
| Electrician£27 above the £280 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £307 | |
| Plumber£26 above the £270 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £296 | |
| Bricklayer£25 above the £260 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £285 | |
| Gas and Heating Engineer£25 above the £259 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £284 | |
| General Builder£24 above the £253 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £277 | |
| Carpenter and joiner£23 above the £240 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £263 | |
| Roofer£23 above the £239 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £262 | |
| Plasterer£22 above the £230 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £252 | |
| Tiler£22 above the £229 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £251 | |
| Drainage Engineer£22 above the £225 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £247 | |
| Decorative Plasterer£22 above the £225 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £247 | |
| GroundworkerModelled only£21 above the £213 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £234 | |
| Painter and decorator£19 above the £200 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £219 | |
| Handyman£18 above the £188 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £206 | |
| Cladding Installer£17 above the £175 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £192 | |
| Suspended Ceiling Installer£17 above the £175 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £192 | |
| General Labourer£13 above the £140 benchmark on Brighton geography. | £153 |
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 Brighton 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 Brighton 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 Brighton, so the next step is pricing one of your own jobs there.
The Rate Sorted calculator opens already set to Brighton, so your own costs go in and a Brighton rate you can quote with comes out.
How long the work takes in Brighton
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 Brighton rates can be multiplied out.
A decorating job in Brighton comes to £438 to £876, on the 4th dearest day rate of the 30 towns on this site.
decorating in Brighton
£438 to £876
A painter and decorator day in Brighton models at £219, 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 Brighton
£277 to £428
A plasterer day in Brighton models at £252, 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 Brighton
£628 to £803
A tiler day in Brighton models at £251, 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 Brighton 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 Brighton measurement.
Why Brighton prices as it does
Brighton prices where its earnings and its housing put it, which is close to the middle.
£406,000
The average house price, against £291,000 across the UK.
£775.80
The South East median weekly pay Brighton is modelled on, 1.2 percent above the UK median of £766.60.
1.40x
Property against the UK average, 40 percent above 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 Brighton 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 Brighton charged for a day of work; what they show is why Brighton lands where it does.
South East WEEKLY PAY
£775.80
Brighton is modelled on the South East median for full time work, according to ONS ASHE April 2025.It is 1.2 percent above the UK median of £766.60 a week, and Brighton models at £219 a decorator day on it.South East ranks 2 of the 11 regions on the register, and Brighton is 3 of the 7 South East towns we model on it.
Brighton HOUSE PRICES
£406,000
The Brighton average, data from the ONS local housing price pages, April 2026 provisional.That is 1.40 times the UK average of £291,000, per the UK House Price Index.3 of the 30 towns we cover have more expensive housing.
Brighton questions
The same answers the structured data on this page gives a search engine, word for word, and every figure in them is a Brighton figure printed above.
What is a typical day rate in Brighton?
A decorator day in Brighton models at £219.
That is number 4 of the 30 towns on this site.
Across the 17 trades a Brighton day runs from £153 for general labourer work up to £307 for electrician work, every one of them modelled on South East earnings and Brighton house prices.
Which trade charges the most per day in Brighton?
Electrician, at £307 a day.
General Labourer work is the cheapest of the 17, at £153.
That leaves a £154 span for the same working day in the same town, and it happens because every trade carries its own national benchmark before any Brighton geography is applied to it.
Is Brighton dearer than Reading?
Brighton is the dearer of the two: £219 in Brighton against £210 in Reading, a £9 gap on a decorator day.
Brighton and Reading both sit in the South East.
Brighton ranks 3 of the 7 towns we model there.
Why are Brighton rates above the national benchmark?
Two published statistics move the Brighton figure: South East median weekly pay of £775.80, 2 of the 11 regions on the register, and a local average house price of £406,000, 4 of the 30 towns.
Together they put Brighton £19 over the £200 national decorator benchmark.
That is 9.5 percent up.
Can I use these Brighton figures as a quote?
No. £219 is a modelled town figure, and the modelled range beside it, £164 to £285, is arithmetic on that figure rather than a measurement of Brighton jobs.
16 of the 17 Brighton 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 Brighton rows, £153 to £307. Each row carries its own provenance, so a modelled Brighton figure can never be read as a sourced one.
Download · CSVbrighton.csvOne row per trade, with the rate, the modelled range and the published spread.
Cite this pageThe Day Rate Report, Brighton day rates, 30 September 2026, https://thedayrate.co.uk/day-rates/brighton/
Embed this figure
The Brighton 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/brighton/"><img src="https://thedayrate.co.uk/og/day-rates-brighton.png" alt="Day rates for 17 trades in Brighton, from The Day Rate Report" width="1200" height="630"></a>
The Brighton 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.