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Student Budgeting

Student living costs in the UK 2023

The student budget is a tricky thing to pin down. But our latest National Student Money Survey reveals where students' money goes once and for all...

purse with £5 note sticking out

Credit: Yevgen Kravchenko, kamui29, Bell Photography 423 – Shutterstock

We all know that student living can be a pricey business. But, how pricey is it exactly?

Rather than taking wild guesses, we can tell you what your expected living costs are, based on what thousands of other students are telling us.

Whether you're wanting to budget your monthly expenses, or simply see how your spending compares to the average student, we've got all the stats on student living costs that you need.

If you're struggling to keep up with rising living costs, see our guide on how to cope with the cost of living crisis.

Average student living costs

ExpenseCost per month
Rent£439
Groceries£133
Household bills£79
Going out£69
Transport£69
Takeaways and eating out£66
Clothes and shopping£48
Holidays and events£36
Health and wellbeing£26
Other£25
Mobile phone£24
Course materials£24
Gifts and charity£21
Friends and family£19
TOTAL£1,078

In our latest annual National Student Money Survey, we asked over 1,750 students where their money goes. The results were very interesting.

The average student's living costs are about £1,078 a month, but our findings reveal that Maintenance Loans often fall far short of covering students' living expenses.

It's probably no surprise that rent takes the biggest chunk out of the student budget. This year it rose to £439 a month. This is a £21 increase from 2022.

Groceries are the second biggest expenditure for students, coming in at £133 a month. This might seem like a lot, but it breaks down to around £31 a week – not too bad for a weekly food shop. Nonetheless, to cut down the costs of groceries further, check out our guide to saving money on food or even try our weekly meal plan.

Everyone knows that students love a good party, and it turns out £69 a month is spent on going out. Some might be surprised that this is more than double the amount students spend on course materials. However, with tuition fees at such a high rate, there's increasing pressure on unis to keep extra course costs to a minimum.

Students also estimate they spend £79 a month on bills, which include gas, electricity, water, broadband and a TV Licence. Our complete guide to student bills has step-by-step advice on how to set up, switch, split bills, and we also have guidance on help with energy bills during these testing times.

Student living costs across the UK

As the graphic above demonstrates, the most expensive places to live as a student in the UK can be found in the South of England.

London is the most expensive region along with the East and South West. This will be partly due to the cost of rent in London and the surrounding regions, which often dwarves the amount you'd pay for an equivalent property elsewhere.

And things are similarly pricey at the opposite end of the UK, too. The cost of living in Scotland isn't far off what students are paying in the South East of England – another notoriously expensive place to live.

Meanwhile, Northern Ireland, the East Midlands and the North East of England are comfortably the cheapest regions in the UK.

But it's worth noting that in this year's survey, student living costs exceed £900 a month in every part of the country.

Know exactly where your money goes with an app-based bank.

Which students spend the most?

Four of the universities in the top 10 for total spending (excluding rent) are based in London – London Metropolitan, City University, the University of East London and LSE.

The rest of the top 10, aside from Open University and Aston University, is made up from universities in the south.

The very lowest spenders are those at Nottingham University, with students spending just £337 a month on all expenses excluding rent. Lancaster, Lincoln, York, Warwick, Leicester and Loughborough University all came in at £400 or less.

At some unis, the average cost of bills seems very low (£5 at Liverpool Hope, for example) – but bear in mind that these figures are averages. A lot of students' utilities will be included in their rent, so they would likely have reported that their bills cost £0.

The table below lists all universities and the average that students spend on living costs, after rent. How do you compare to your classmates?

UniversityTotal (£)Groceries (£)Takeaways and eating out (£)Transport (£)Going out and socialising (£)Household bills (£)Mobile phone (£)Clothes and shopping (£)Health and wellbeing (£)Course materials (£)Holidays and events (£)Gifts and charity (£)Relatives or friends (who you financially support) (£)Other (£)
Aberdeen4271345253335117181112814720
Aberystwyth678144776549652455273739272842
Anglia Ruskin924100113116751074486554658394044
Arden98792116941431335485417649323241
Arts University Bournemouth977113122128871104297393560404657
Aston8191019089631203076364660383041
Bath7501711167610590205029202922129
Birmingham626127706556732048282742262122
Bournemouth761168535889842949293045353656
Brighton8661221169297803310336428121377
Bristol45614037623748153123111912418
Brunel713411569040225255481445880
Cambridge750166957683333555453063281033
Cardiff6941295011972943339461348241314
Cardiff Metropolitan59570545362861972223936242435
Chester577147535971782231191228201917
Chichester52314368108681523431013152000
City, UoL88016512313513942267716315546323
Conservatoire for Dance and Drama629765853461173322112446244673
De Montfort4478654375021936173238291723
Derby55580496617104225533202633429
Dundee59518863732993143513132624250
Durham5111262954437715463094918610
East Anglia579128844940733149132129112429
East London8761311021081091032984375938261042
Edge Hill643116519358442741373241353830
Edinburgh Napier781746472421022195414813036650
Essex507162492911351203218647115
Falmouth4821535058702325431520131000
Glasgow48514062512944122411173820038
Glasgow Caledonian72125060307317626201822245108
Goldsmiths63313482471266492453241321630
Hull4371014156267323917164317735
Keele47614635437147143319121915616
King's College London59014190461035915552912911137
Kingston696154668884861633271838134432
Lancaster39313258534322810108247910
Leeds4631084884634511311414181927
Leicester35498237427686296184210
Lincoln38413843404131917153116129
Liverpool580122358496562534221331172719
Liverpool Hope49915765656051344883725012
Liverpool John Moores64117843797612928278128142414
London Metropolitan881204786710696384641514194063
London South Bank762117791061131082049293059291410
Loughborough34696404028219261922018819
LSE84879114836993441001464511413111
Manchester53316455604461223616102281916
Manchester Met4791453545379313371610128623
Middlesex54940555070026180208052570
Newcastle4541304653424611392582217311
Newman569183421237822338251333351728
Northampton41511336494869271823447018
Northumbria518141374748771240191223201427
Nottingham33710822423057111915118808
Nottingham Trent4531236860503914291561491412
Open University7941835254851982531181035162165
Oxford4158461232456142821233328714
Oxford Brookes633176516651571851366932008
Portsmouth417112436443269361642212325
Queen's Belfast56210139767863204822274430124
Reading55898433546118233333395022415
Royal Holloway4559652316744640261936111710
Salford55212258836633265215292022917
Sheffield45913923594265132921102713019
Sheffield Hallam6331444849801042938191839222419
South Wales476148232083301718187835050
Southampton4141204951294911272031819118
Southampton Solent494971737431932422170520020
St Andrews485171595150717111092111013
Staffordshire6301752313105148244312261161826
Stirling4641004955971919377192420710
Strathclyde68815060133331810804088274702
Suffolk49714531478520144125153118520
Sunderland6811858069849913581715361608
Swansea54214057596412116162171371012
UCLan657911036033833270232235272949
Ulster754150677311793205320304723060
University for the Creative Arts636133616766117114824581710024
Warwick3811165449305682520214602
West of England, Bristol474129367556291731101246111011
Winchester535158268246751925171284503
Wolverhampton68118573508888293015463318523
York382127413736251526208172108
York St John6119025472028336281722012050
AVERAGE
639
133
66
69
69
79
24
48
26
24
36
21
19
25

The data has been filtered to exclude universities where there were not enough respondents, or where the results included significant outliers.

Check out our list detailing the cost of student accommodation at each UK university for more info.

Is the Maintenance Loan enough?

It's all very well working out how much students spend each month. But the big question is, how do they pay for it?

The majority of students will be eligible for some form of Maintenance Loan to cover their living costs at university. However, most students report that it doesn't stretch far enough. The average student receives just £496 a month from their Maintenance Loan, which falls £582 a month short of covering the average living costs (£1,078 a month).

In fact, 64% believe the Maintenance Loan isn't big enough.

Students told us:

  • [The] cost of living has increased and the loan doesn't cover it anymore.
  • I get the lowest possible amount [because] my dad is a high earner. However, he is very stingy with money. My loan doesn't cover my rent.
  • My Maintenance Loan doesn't cover rent, let alone other expenses such as bills and food etc.

Over half of students (53%) turn to their parents for extra funds, with students getting an average of £227 a month from their mums and dads.

But, fewer students than last year are relying on money from their parents. Many are turning to ways to make money from home, and the proportion of students getting a part-time job dropped from 62% in 2022 to 56% in 2023.

Some students turned to less conventional ways to fund themselves during university – from stocks and shares (4%) and social media (4%) to sex work (3%) and cryptocurrencies (4%).

It's clear that the Maintenance Loan isn't enough to cover living costs for the vast majority of students. The government needs to make some serious changes to Student Finance in order to fix this.

To make your Maintenance Loan last longer, check out our guide to budgeting at university.

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