Driveway and patio cleaning in the UK is normally priced by the square metre, at roughly £3 to £6 per m² for straightforward work, with a minimum charge that catches small areas. As whole jobs that is about £90 to £160 for a patio up to 20 m², £100 to £200 for a single drive of 30 to 40 m², £150 to £280 for a double and £225 to £350 from 90 m² upwards. Re-sanding block paving adds £1.50 to £3 per m². Sealing is a separate visit at £4 to £10 per m², or £200 to £300 to clean and seal a small drive together.
Those are UK market bands, not any one company's price list. The Midlands sits in the lower half of every one of them, and London and the south east sit above the top.
Typical prices
| Job | Typical range |
|---|---|
| Cleaning, per square metre | £3 to £6 |
| Minimum charge | Usually billed as a 30 m² minimum |
| Patio, up to 20 m² | £90 to £160 |
| Single drive, 30 to 40 m² | £100 to £200 |
| Double drive, 50 to 70 m² | £150 to £280 |
| Large drive, 90 m² and over | £225 to £350 |
| Block paving re-sanding, per m² | £1.50 to £3 |
| Sealing, separate visit, per m² | £4 to £10 |
| Clean and seal together, single drive | £200 to £300 |
| Heavy moss, weed or oil pre-treatment, per m² | £2 to £5 |
The bands come from MyJobQuote of May 2026, which prices a 30 m² drive at £100 to £160, TaskRabbit UK of September 2026 at £3 to £8 per m², Housekeep of March 2026 for patio sizes outside London, and MyJobQuote's sealing guide of August 2026.
Ignore the £8.50 to £15.50 per m² figure Checkatrade and MyBuilder both publish. It does not survive their own arithmetic: MyBuilder prices a 40 m² wash at £250 to £350, which is £6.25 to £8.75 per m².
What moves the price
Area, then the minimum. Below about 30 m² the minimum takes over and the per m² rate stops meaning much, because travel, setup and water cost the same either way. A patio booked alongside a drive is far cheaper than the same patio booked alone.
Surface. Block paving costs more than concrete for the same area because of the joints: growth out of them, sand back into them. Natural stone costs more again, because lower pressure means more passes.
Condition. Heavy moss, established weeds, black spot lichen and oil are extra work, not the same work done slower. Expect £2 to £5 per m² of pre-treatment, or a flat £50 to £100 on a neglected surface.
Where the run-off goes. Surface water drains usually discharge straight to a watercourse rather than to treatment, and government guidance is explicit that only clean water should reach one. On a sloping plot, or a drive falling towards a neighbour, collecting the slurry takes real time.
Re-sanding, the line cheap quotes leave out
The single most useful thing to check on a block paving quote. Kiln-dried sand in the joints is structural, not cosmetic. Block paving works by interlock and the sand transfers load from one block to the next. Washing takes it out. If nobody puts it back, blocks rock under a car, edge courses creep outwards, and weed seed drops into open gaps instead of finding them already full. A drive that was jetted and never re-sanded is often in worse condition a year later than one nobody touched.
At £1.50 to £3 per m² it is not the expensive part of the job, just the part that is easy to omit and hard to notice missing until the following winter.
Ask whether kiln-dried sand is included, and whether it is brushed in and topped up in stages or scattered once. Wide joints can take a jointing compound instead, which resists washing out at a higher material cost.
Sealing, and whether it earns its money
Sealing is priced separately at roughly £4 to £10 per m², often more than the cleaning itself. MyJobQuote puts block paving at £7 to £15 per m² and asphalt at £4 to £8; Checkatrade prices a two-coat acrylic seal at £3 to £5.
Timing matters more than the product. A sealer traps whatever is underneath it. Over a damp surface it can go milky and has to be stripped off, which is a worse job than the cleaning was. Over remaining staining it makes the stain permanent.
So it should never happen on the same day as the clean: the surface needs two or three dry days first. Anyone offering to clean and seal in one visit in British weather is telling you something.
Done properly it slows staining, holds the sand down and shortens the next clean, and wants redoing every few years. Reasonable value on a drive you intend to keep, wasted on one you are cleaning to sell the house.
Surfaces that change the answer
Concrete and standard block paving take full pressure and are cheapest per m².
Indian sandstone and limestone are porous and soft enough to be scored by a lance held too close. Acid-based cleaners etch limestone and pull colour out of sandstone permanently.
Porcelain is hard and largely unaffected, but the mortar joints between the slabs are not, and that is where porcelain patios get wrecked.
Imprinted concrete is the one people get wrong most often. What has gone dull is the sealer coat, not the concrete, so the fix is a strip and reseal rather than a harder wash.
Tarmac should not be jet washed hard at all. Pressure strips the bitumen binder and leaves loose aggregate, and that cannot be put back.
Weeds and moss: removing is not killing
Washing removes growth. It does not kill what is left in the joint, so it returns, usually within a season.
Killing it is a chemical job with a legal edge. A hard surface weedkiller or moss killer is a plant protection product, and under the Plant Protection Products (Sustainable Use) Regulations 2012 a professional-use one may only be applied by someone holding a certificate of competence, or working under supervision. Algae and lichen products fall under the separate biocides regime, where no such certificate applies but COSHH still does.
If a quote includes a treatment, ask which product and ask to see the certificate. Black spot lichen will not come off under pressure alone, so anyone promising to remove it with a machine and nothing else has not met it.
Doing it yourself, honestly
For a small slab patio, hiring is often the right call. A pressure washer is roughly £20 to £150 a day depending on the machine, with a light duty unit around £45. Take the rotary patio attachment if the hire shop has one, because it is the difference between an even finish and a striped one.
Block paving changes the maths. A domestic machine and a lance strip the sand out of every joint, and putting it back becomes your job. Kiln-dried sand is £4 to £8 a 25 kg bag, covering anywhere from 4 m² on wide joints to 20 m² on tight ones. Budget an afternoon for brushing it in.
Do it yourself when the area is small, the surface is concrete or ordinary slabs, and the worst outcome is an uneven finish. Pay someone when it is block paving, natural stone, imprinted concrete or tarmac, or when a mistake would be permanent rather than untidy.
Getting a comparable quote
Give the area in square metres, and say what the surface is. Everything else follows from those two answers.
Ask whether re-sanding is included, which is the most common gap between two quotes on the same drive.
Ask whether sealing is a separate visit, and if it is offered same day, how the surface will be dry.
Describe the condition, because black spot, thick moss and oil get repriced on the day otherwise.
Frequently asked questions
Is it cheaper per square metre for a bigger drive? Yes. Travel, setup and running water cost the same on 20 m² as on 90 m², so they weigh far more heavily on a small job. The rate per m² falls as the area rises, which is why a small patio on its own is the least economic booking on the list.
Is there a minimum charge? Almost always. Checkatrade describes it as normally a 30 m² minimum rather than a flat fee, which comes to roughly £90 to £150 at typical rates. Either way, a very small patio costs more per square metre than the headline rate suggests.
How often should a drive be cleaned? Every two to three years for most Nottingham properties, more often on a shaded plot or under trees. Spring is the moment: the growth has had all winter to establish, and the surface then stays clean through the months you use it. An autumn clean is green again by February.
Why is one quote half the price of another? Usually one of four things: re-sanding left out, black spot or heavy moss not priced, the wrong equipment, or no plan for the run-off. Ask for the quote itemised into cleaning, treatment, re-sanding and sealing, and the gap normally explains itself.
For the method rather than the price, our driveway and patio cleaning service page sets out what is covered, and the hard floor care guide makes the same point indoors: match the pressure and the chemistry to the surface, or you damage the thing you are cleaning.
