Chimney Sweep Prices 2026: What 93 UK Sweeps Charge

What a chimney sweep costs in 2026

The job most people book is a routine sweep of one chimney for a wood burner, multi-fuel stove or open fire. Across the 93 firms with a price for that, the average (median) is £70, the middle price when they're all lined up. The typical range (the middle 50% of prices) is £60 to £80.

37 of the 93 firms give a "from" price, averaging £75, and the 56 that give a fixed price charge £70 on average. We count both. Where a firm charges different prices by season, we used its November price.

Stove or open fire

Most sweeps charge one price whatever is burning at the bottom of the chimney. Of the 31 firms that list an open fire price alongside their stove price, 21 charge the same. 8 charge more for an open fire and 2 charge less.

Prices by job

Nests and camera checks

Removing a bird's nest is the extra most firms list: 57 of them, averaging £140. Many quote a starting price, because a big nest takes longer to clear. By law, a nest can only be removed once birds have stopped using it.

CCTV is harder to compare. 38 firms list a CCTV price, but some sell it on its own, some as an add-on and some as a package with a sweep. Among 10 that we checked closely, a camera check added to a sweep cost £30 to £45, an inspection on its own £60 to about £100, and a sweep-and-camera package £110 to £225, sometimes sold as a check before a new stove is fitted.

What this means if you're booking a sweep

• About £70 is a fair price to sweep one chimney. Above £80, you're paying more than three in four firms charge.
• Expect the same price for a stove or an open fire at most firms.
• Ask whether the price includes a smoke test and a certificate.
• Ask what they charge if they find a nest, before they arrive.
• Have every chimney done on the same visit.
• Get prices from at least three local sweeps.

How we collected and checked the prices

On 1 November 2026 we ran 193 searches for chimney sweeps in 191 towns and cities across the UK. They returned 1,046 results, in which we found 376 local firms. We left out directories, quote sites and firms that pass jobs on to others, and used only prices from the sweeps themselves. Where one business runs several sites, we counted it once. We left out one price list dated 2014.

The standard job is sweeping one chimney for a wood burner, multi-fuel stove or open fire (the stove price where a firm charges differently). Each price was read and checked against its source. Then a separate checker re-read every standard price from scratch, without seeing the first reading: 86 of 93 prices matched. 4 firms' sites wouldn't load for the checker, so we checked those prices against the copy we had saved. A third check of the other 3 led to 2 corrections: a seasonal price that we updated to the November rate, and a fixed price that had been recorded as a starting price. Nest removal prices were checked the same way: all 55 that the checker could read matched.

Each firm counts once. The average price we give is the median: the middle price when all the firms' prices are lined up, so a few very high or low prices can't skew it. Prices published without VAT have 20% added; prices with no VAT wording are taken as the price you pay. We could place 45 firms in a region; the South East averages £60 (13 firms), and no other region reached 10. These are advertised prices, which aren't always what people pay. More detail is on our methodology page.

Download the data

The CSV has the price figures in this article, by job and region. It doesn't name any firm.

Frequently asked questions

Are you a chimney sweep? You can send us your prices directly. As submissions build up, we'll add them alongside the published prices in future editions of this research.

Our earlier surveys covered gutter cleaning, skip hire, EICR and boiler service prices. For more on booking a sweep, see our chimney sweep cost guide.