Airbnb fire safety regulations: what UK hosts must do
What UK fire safety law requires of Airbnb and short-term let hosts: the fire risk assessment, smoke and CO alarms, escape routes, fire doors, guest information, and the rules in England, Scotland and Wales.
If you let a property on Airbnb or as any short-term let, fire safety is not optional and it is not just good practice — it is the law. Because guests pay to sleep in the property, your let is covered by the same fire safety legislation as a hotel or a B&B, and you are personally responsible for getting it right. This guide sets out, in plain terms, what UK fire safety regulations actually require of an Airbnb host.
The law that applies to your Airbnb
Short-term lets in England and Wales fall under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 — the same order that governs hotels, guest houses and other premises where people pay to stay. Under it, you (or whoever controls the property) are the “responsible person”, and you have a legal duty to assess the fire risk and put appropriate precautions in place. This applies whether you let one room occasionally or run several whole properties full time.
The duty was reinforced by the Fire Safety Act 2021 and the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022, and in 2023 the government published dedicated guidance, Making your small paying-guest accommodation safe from fire, aimed squarely at hosts of small premises like Airbnbs. Scotland and Wales have their own parallel frameworks, covered below.
The single most important requirement: a fire risk assessment
Every short-term let must have a fire risk assessment. This is the legal foundation of everything else — it identifies the fire hazards in your specific property, the people at risk, and the precautions needed to keep them safe. Everything else on this page flows from it: your assessment is what determines exactly which alarms, escape routes and equipment your property needs. We cover how to do one in our guide to the Airbnb fire risk assessment. Fire safety is one line in the full Airbnb compliance checklist, or check where you stand with the free Airbnb compliance checker.
What fire safety measures does an Airbnb usually need?
The precise measures depend on your fire risk assessment, the size and layout of the property and the number of guests. For a typical small self-contained let, the government guidance points to the following as a baseline:
- Smoke alarms on every storey, ideally mains-powered and interlinked so that one going off sounds them all.
- Carbon monoxide alarms in any room with a gas, oil or solid-fuel appliance such as a boiler, fire or log burner.
- Clear escape routes — hallways, stairs and exits kept free of clutter, with doors guests can open easily from the inside without a key.
- Fire doors where the assessment calls for them, particularly protecting the escape route in a property over one storey.
- Fire-fighting equipment where appropriate, such as a fire blanket in the kitchen and, in larger premises, extinguishers.
- Emergency lighting in larger or more complex premises where escape routes would be dark if the power failed.
- Clear fire information for guests — a simple notice showing the escape route, the assembly point and what to do if the alarm sounds, displayed where guests will see it.
These are a starting point, not a tick-list that replaces your assessment. A larger house, a property over several floors, or one let to more people will need more, and a small studio may need less.
Larger properties and HMOs
If your let is bigger — multiple bedrooms let to unrelated groups, or a property that meets the definition of a house in multiple occupation — the duties become more demanding, and additional licensing and safety standards can apply on top of the Fire Safety Order. If you are in any doubt about whether your property is treated as an HMO, check with your local council before you let it.
Scotland and Wales
In Scotland, short-term lets require a licence from the local council, and the mandatory licence conditions include fire safety: adequate fire detection, fire-fighting equipment where needed, and clear escape routes, broadly to a domestic safety standard. You cannot legally let without the licence. In Wales, short-term lets are subject to their own registration and licensing arrangements, alongside the general fire safety duties. We cover the differences by nation in our licensing guides.
What happens if you get it wrong
Fire safety breaches are taken seriously. Enforcement ranges from an improvement notice, through prohibition of letting, to prosecution — and serious breaches can carry an unlimited fine and, in the worst cases, imprisonment. Just as important, a fire in a let where you cannot show you assessed the risk and acted on it exposes you to civil liability and can void your insurance. The cost of doing it properly is trivial next to the cost of not.
How Complys helps
Complys keeps the whole fire-safety picture for each of your lets in one place: it builds the fire risk assessment the law requires, stores your alarm, gas and electrical records, and reminds you before anything falls due for review — so if a guest, an insurer or a council ever asks, you can show exactly what was in place and when. See Airbnb & short-term let compliance software.
Official guidance and sources
Complys builds the fire risk assessment every short-term let needs and keeps your alarms, certificates and reviews in one place - so you can prove compliance if a guest, insurer or council asks.