Student accommodation in London

Cheapest we currently list. £198/week, subject to availability and eligibility.

What that buys. At the lower end, a room in a shared flat further out. At the upper end, a studio in Bloomsbury or South Kensington with your own kitchen.

When to book. London fills earliest of any city we cover. Rooms for a September start go from January, and by May the cheaper end of each building is usually gone.

Bills. Every London room we currently list includes them, which makes weekly rates here directly comparable. That is not true everywhere.

Rent is not the whole number. In London, travel is the line that catches people out, because a cheaper room further out can cost more once you add a daily commute.

Work it out properly before you compare two rooms:

• Multiply the weekly rate by the billable weeks, not by the months you will be here. A 51 week contract and a 44 week contract at the same weekly rate are not the same price.
• Add travel. Check whether you qualify for a student discount on season tickets through Transport for London, and price it for the days you will actually be on campus. Two days a week is a different calculation from five.
• Keep the deposit separate in your head. It is returnable, so it is not part of what the year costs, but you need it upfront.

A room that is twenty pounds a week cheaper and thirty minutes further out is usually not cheaper.

This matters more in London than anywhere else we cover, because several of the large universities teach across sites that are nowhere near each other.

University College London teaches in Bloomsbury and also at UCL East in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Those are different ends of the city. King's College London runs several campuses across the Strand, Southwark and south London. Imperial College London is centred on South Kensington. LSE is compact and central. Queen Mary University of London is out at Mile End.

So "near your university" is not a useful instruction in London. Find the building your department teaches in, then work from that address. Every property page here shows the computed distance to each university we hold data for, which is a start, but your own timetable is the real test.

If your course uses more than one site, check the journey to both before you commit. Placements move people around this city more than they expect.

Bloomsbury and King's Cross. Closest to UCL, SOAS and the British Library. The most walkable option if you study there, and priced accordingly. This is where you pay for minutes.

South Bank and Waterloo. Suits King's and anyone who wants to be central without Bloomsbury prices. Good for late finishes, because the river crossings stay busy well into the night.

South Kensington. Imperial's own neighbourhood. Quiet, expensive, and excellent if you are at Imperial. Harder to justify if you are not.

Stratford. The cheaper end of what we list. The reason to look here is the Elizabeth line rather than the area itself. It puts a lot of central London within a single train.

Further out. Worth considering once you have priced the commute, not before.

Room in a shared flat. Your own bedroom, shared kitchen, usually a shared bathroom. The cheapest way to live centrally. Ask how many people share the kitchen, because six is a different experience from twelve.

En-suite room. Your own bedroom and bathroom, shared kitchen. The middle option and the most common format in purpose-built buildings.

Studio. Everything private, including a kitchen. London has proportionally more of these than most cities we cover, which is part of why the ceiling here is so high. Check the floor plan rather than the photograph: some are genuinely small, and you will be studying in that room.

Whichever format you pick, check whether the quoted rent is per person or for the whole property. On whole-flat listings it is for the property.

This is where the real cost of a room is decided, and it is what most listings leave out.

• Contract length. Ask for the start and end dates, not the number of weeks. Then check them against your term dates and whether you need somewhere before or after.
• The deposit. Ask what it is, when it comes back, and specifically whether any advance payment is credited against rent, so you do not count the same money twice.
• Guarantor requirements. London operators commonly want a UK-based guarantor, and the alternative is usually paying more upfront. Ask what happens if you do not have one before you get attached to a room.
• Cancellation terms. Ask what happens if your visa is refused or your university place changes. The answer differs by operator and sometimes by room, and it is worth having in writing.
• What the bills cover. Bills are included in everything we currently list here, but ask whether there is a fair-use cap on electricity.

We will ask these for you on any room on this page. That is what the enquiry is for.

These apply in every city, not just here: what to check before you book.

London decisions are shaped by the Tube, the Elizabeth line and the Overground rather than by walking, which is the opposite of most cities we cover.

Put the property address and your actual teaching building into Transport for London's journey planner, at the time you need to arrive. Look at the walk at each end, not just the train time, and check the same journey late at night if you will be coming home after ten. Step-free routes are worth checking in advance if you need them, because coverage is uneven.

Also check whether you qualify for a student discount on season tickets. It applies to some ticket types and not others, so read the eligibility before you budget for it.

In order, because each step removes more than the next:

1. Set your weekly budget. In London this eliminates more than anything else.
2. Find the building you will actually be taught in.
3. Pick two or three areas that work for both, using the area notes above.
4. Choose your room format, and read the floor plan rather than the photograph.
5. Enquire on two or three, not one. London's cheaper rooms go first and you want a second option already moving.

Send the enquiry with your campus, your dates, your budget and your room type. The more specific it is, the more useful the answer.