How much does legionella testing cost, line by line?
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Key points
- Lab analysis starts around £45 per sample on published prices for culture to BS EN ISO 11731; most labs quote per job instead.
- The per-sample fee is only one line. Sampling visit, kit, courier and VAT can add as much again on a small job.
- You pay per outlet sampled, so the sampling plan in the written scheme sets the invoice: a five-point round is five fees.
- Culture takes about 10 days and is the compliance method; qPCR is faster but counts live and dead cells together.
- Most simple systems do not need routine sampling at all. Temperature control is the primary control; testing answers a question the assessment has asked.
A legionella water test costs from about £45 per sample for the laboratory analysis alone, based on the prices UKAS-accredited laboratories actually publish. That figure is the floor, not the bill: once you add a sampling visit or courier, the sample kit, and the fact that you pay separately for every outlet sampled, a realistic first sampling round on a small commercial system lands in the low hundreds of pounds. This page breaks the cost into its parts so you can read a quote line by line.
Line 1: the laboratory analysis fee
The reference method is culture to BS EN ISO 11731: the lab filters the sample, cultures it, and counts legionella colonies, which takes around ten days. Of the laboratories in our UK testing labs directory, the two that publish prices list £45 per sample (with a 12-working-day turnaround) and £82.68 (around ten days). Every other accredited lab we verified declines to publish a price at all, which is itself the useful data point: expect to ask for a quote, and expect the quote to depend on volume. Regular contract customers pay less per sample than one-off callers.
One check matters more than the price: confirm the lab's UKAS accreditation schedule actually covers Legionella in water. A lab can be accredited for other tests and not this one. The directory lists each lab's scope status and UKAS number, and shows "Not published" where a field could not be verified rather than guessing.
Line 2: getting the sample to the lab
The analysis fee assumes a valid sample arrives at the lab. Getting it there costs money one of three ways:
- A sampling visit by a technician, which is the usual route for duty holders and is priced per visit, sometimes with a mileage element. This is often the largest single line on a small job.
- A postal kit, where the lab supplies sterile bottles, usually with a cool pack, and you take the samples yourself following BS 7592. The kit and its return carriage are charged for.
- Courier or drop-off, where you sample and arrange delivery. The sample must reach the lab quickly and stay cool, so next-day courier is the norm, and a weekend in a warm depot can invalidate the run.
Sampling done badly is money spent on an uninterpretable result, so the cheapest line to cut is never the one that protects sample integrity.
Line 3: the multiplier, samples per round
Every outlet sampled is a separate fee, and a meaningful round rarely means one bottle. A basic hot-and-cold system round might cover the calorifier flow and return, the nearest and furthest hot outlets, and the nearest and furthest cold outlets: five or six samples before you add any point the risk assessment has flagged. The worked example below shows how the lines stack.
| Line | Basis | Indicative cost |
|---|---|---|
| 6 samples, culture to BS EN ISO 11731 | 6 × published lab fee (£45 – £83) | £270 – £500 |
| Sampling visit by technician | Per visit | Varies; often comparable to the lab fees on a small job |
| Sample kit and cool-pack carriage | Per kit, if postal route instead | Charged on top of analysis |
| qPCR fast screen (optional) | Per sample, alongside culture | Additional per-sample fee |
| VAT | 20% on the whole | Added at invoice |
Figures are indicative and built from the published prices in the labs directory, not a quote. Get the sampling plan priced against your written scheme.
Free legionella risk assessment template
A structured Word document following the five-step approach in ACOP L8. Covers risk identification, written scheme, monitoring, and records. If it isn't written down, you can't evidence it.
Follows ACoP L8 and HSG274 Part 2. Free. No spam.
Culture versus qPCR: paying for speed or for the number
Culture is slow but definitive for compliance: the action levels of 100 and 1,000 CFU per litre, explained in sampling and action levels, are culture counts, and a culture result maps directly onto them. qPCR detects legionella DNA and can return a result within a day, which is valuable when a system is out of temperature range or a case is being investigated, but it cannot distinguish live organisms from dead ones, so it screens rather than certifies. Budget-conscious sites use each for what it is good at: qPCR when hours matter, culture when the number has to stand up.
The cheapest line of all: not sampling when you do not need to
For most well-controlled systems, routine legionella sampling is not required at all. Temperature control is the primary control: hot water stored at 60°C and reaching 50°C at outlets (55°C in healthcare), cold below 20°C, weekly flushing of little-used outlets, all recorded in a log book. Sampling earns its cost when the risk assessment asks a question temperature logs cannot answer: a system that will not hold temperature, a positive history, an outbreak investigation, or a written scheme in a high-risk setting such as a cooling tower, where quarterly sampling is standard. The testing guide sets out when testing is and is not needed.
Read a testing quote as four lines: the lab fee per sample, the visit or courier, the number of outlets in the plan, and VAT. The plan is the only line you control, so make sure the written scheme names exactly the outlets that need sampling and no more.
If you are pricing a whole compliance exercise rather than a sampling round, the cost calculator gives an indicative figure for the assessment itself, and the temperature checker handles the routine monitoring that keeps most systems out of the lab altogether.
Free legionella risk assessment template
A structured Word document following the five-step approach in ACOP L8. Covers risk identification, written scheme, monitoring, and records. If it isn't written down, you can't evidence it.
Follows ACoP L8 and HSG274 Part 2. Free. No spam.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a legionella water test cost per sample?
Published laboratory prices in our UK labs directory start at £45 per sample for culture testing to BS EN ISO 11731, with another accredited laboratory publishing £82.68. Those are laboratory list prices per sample before sampling visit, courier and VAT. Because most labs do not publish prices at all, treat £45 to £85 as the indicative floor for the analysis itself, not a ceiling.
Why do most legionella testing labs not publish prices?
Because the analysis fee is only part of the job. The real price depends on how many outlets are sampled, who takes the samples, how they reach the lab, and whether you need a fast qPCR screen alongside the ten-day culture. Labs quote per job rather than per brochure. Where a lab does publish a per-sample price, our directory shows it; where it does not, the field reads Not published rather than a guess.
How many water samples do you need to take?
It depends on the system and what the risk assessment is trying to find out. A common minimum set for a hot and cold water system is the calorifier flow and return, the nearest and furthest hot outlets, and the nearest and furthest cold outlets, which is already five or six samples. Each sample is billed separately, so the sampling plan in the written scheme is what sets the invoice.
Is qPCR cheaper than culture testing for legionella?
Per result it is often comparable or more expensive, not cheaper, but it is much faster, sometimes within a day, because it detects legionella DNA rather than growing the bacteria. The catch is that qPCR counts live and dead cells together, so it is a screening and triage tool, not a like-for-like replacement for the culture method that the action levels of 100 and 1,000 CFU per litre are built on. Many sites pay for both: qPCR for speed, culture for the compliance number.
Do landlords need to pay for legionella testing?
Usually no. HSE landlord guidance says routine sampling is not normally required for simple domestic systems; temperature control and basic management are the primary controls. Sampling is typically needed where the risk assessment identifies a specific reason, such as a system that will not hold temperature, an outbreak investigation, or a written scheme in a higher-risk setting like a care home or cooling tower site.
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