How much does IT support cost in the UK? (2026 guide to per-user pricing)

IT support pricing in the UK is opaque because most providers quote after a call rather than publishing rates. This guide sets out the pricing models you will meet, the ranges commonly seen in the market, what moves a quote up or down, a worked example for a 25-person firm, and the questions that stop you comparing a cheap quote with an expensive one that actually covers more. If you want a number for your own business first, the IT support cost calculator uses our published per-device rates, and the pricing page explains what sits behind them.

The four pricing models

Per user per month. One price for each member of staff, covering their devices and accounts. Simple to budget, scales with headcount, and the most common model for professional services firms where everyone has a laptop and a Microsoft 365 account.

Per device per month. Separate prices for computers, servers, firewalls, printers and phones. Fairer for businesses with shared workstations or a lot of infrastructure relative to staff, such as plant hire depots, clinics or clubs. This is the model we use for indicative pricing.

Block hours. You buy a bank of engineer hours in advance at a discount and draw them down. Cheaper if you rarely need help, but there is no monitoring, no scheduled patching, and no incentive for the provider to prevent problems.

Break-fix. Pay as you go, by the hour, after something has failed. No contract, no monitoring, no SLA. Cheapest on paper, most expensive in a bad year. The comparison is in break-fix versus managed IT support.

Most businesses of up to 250 people end up on per-user or per-device managed contracts with projects quoted separately.

What the UK market typically charges

There is no official price index for IT support, so what follows is observation from published price lists and the quotes businesses show us when switching, not a statistic.

• Per user, managed: most UK MSPs that publish prices sit somewhere between roughly £30 and £120 per user per month. The bottom of that range is remote helpdesk plus basic patching and antivirus. The top bundles EDR, email security, awareness training, Microsoft 365 backup, on-site visits and extended hours.
• Per device, managed: computers commonly in the low tens of pounds per month, servers in the low hundreds, with firewalls, printers and phones priced individually.
• Block hours: engineer rates commonly in the range of £70 to £120 per hour, discounted for larger blocks.
• Break-fix: similar hourly rates, often with a minimum charge per visit and premium rates out of hours.

The spread is wide because "IT support" covers everything from a helpdesk to a full security stack. Two quotes at £45 and £90 per user are not the same product, and the cheaper one may leave you buying the difference later.

What you get at each price band

Because scope drives price, it helps to know what the bands usually contain before you read a quote.

Entry level (roughly £30 to £50 per user). Remote helpdesk in business hours, RMM monitoring, Windows patching, managed antivirus, Microsoft 365 user administration. On-site visits and out-of-hours are chargeable. Backup is often monitored but not included. Suitable for a cloud-only office with low risk appetite and no server.

Standard managed (roughly £50 to £80 per user). Everything above plus third-party application patching, managed EDR rather than antivirus, email filtering, MFA enforcement, backup included and restore-tested, an on-site allowance, joiners and leavers, and periodic account reviews. This is where most businesses of up to 250 people with a server or two should expect to sit.

Security-led (roughly £80 to £120 per user and above). Everything above plus security awareness training and phishing simulation, Microsoft 365 backup, vulnerability scanning, support for Cyber Essentials, extended or 24/7 helpdesk hours, and a named account manager with quarterly strategy reviews. Common in legal, financial and healthcare settings where clients or regulators ask for evidence.

The bands are approximate and overlap. A provider quoting £40 per user with EDR, backup and on-site visits included is a better deal than one quoting £70 without them, which is why the exclusions list is worth more than the headline price.

What moves the price

When a provider scopes a contract, these are the factors that change the number.

Two of these deserve a note. Security tier is where the biggest gaps between quotes hide, so ask whether "security" means antivirus or a managed EDR platform. And servers are expensive to support because they are single points of failure that need patching, monitoring, backup and restore testing, which is why per-device server rates are many times a laptop's.

A worked example: a 25-person firm

Take a professional services business in Hertfordshire with 25 staff, one office, a Windows server for a line-of-business application, a firewall, two network printers and 20 desk phones. Everyone has a laptop and Microsoft 365.

Using our indicative per-device figures (reviewed October 2026, confirmed in a written quote):

That is roughly £11,550 a year, or about £38.50 per user per month once the infrastructure is spread across staff. It covers monitoring, patching, endpoint security, helpdesk, backup checks, joiners and leavers, network management and account reviews.

Without the desk phones the figure is £632.50 a month. Without the server as well (a cloud-only firm) it is £482.50, about £19 per user. This is why per-device pricing rewards businesses that have simplified their infrastructure.

Not in that number: Microsoft 365 licences (paid to Microsoft, usually passed through), any new hardware, and projects such as a migration or office move, which are quoted as fixed-price work.

In-house salary versus a managed contract

The alternative to a contract is a hire. Job adverts for first and second line IT support engineers in Hertfordshire and outer London commonly show salaries from the high twenties to around £40,000, with central London higher. Add employer National Insurance, pension contributions, holiday, sick cover and training and the fully loaded cost is commonly upwards of £40,000 to £50,000 for one person, before you buy the monitoring, EDR, ticketing and backup tools they need to do the job.

Against that, the 25-person contract above is about £11,550 a year including the tooling, with a team behind it rather than one person, and no gap when someone is on holiday. Even doubling the contract figure to allow for on-site visits and projects leaves a wide margin. The detailed comparison is in in-house versus outsourced IT support. The point at which the sums change is around 100 staff with complex systems, where an internal lead backed by a co-managed contract often wins.

London versus Hertfordshire

Providers based in central London carry higher rent and salary costs and tend to price accordingly, particularly where contracts include regular on-site visits. A Hertfordshire-based provider can support a London office remotely at the same rate as a local one and visit when needed, which is how we work with businesses in Enfield and north London from Hoddesdon, a few miles up the A10.

For a remote-first contract, the difference is usually modest. For a contract with an engineer on site two days a week, it is larger. If you are comparing a London quote with a Hertfordshire quote, check whether the on-site allowance is the same. Our IT support in London and IT support in Hertfordshire pages describe how coverage works for each.

Hidden costs to look for

The monthly fee is rarely the whole cost. Ask about each of these before signing.

• Onboarding fees. Some providers charge a one-off setup fee. Others include it. Either is fine if it is disclosed.
• On-site visit charges. Per-visit fees, travel time, or a monthly cap after which visits are billable.
• Out-of-hours rates. What a Saturday call costs, and whether there is a minimum charge.
• Project minimums. Anything outside the contract quoted at day rates with a minimum.
• Licence margins. Whether Microsoft 365 is passed through at Microsoft's price or marked up.
• Backup storage. Per-gigabyte or per-device charges for cloud backup that grow as your data does.
• Security add-ons. EDR, email filtering and awareness training sold as extras after you have signed for "security".
• Price increases. Annual uplifts, whether indexed to inflation or at the provider's discretion.
• Exit costs. Fees for handing over documentation and credentials, which should be zero.
• Minimum terms and auto-renewal. Covered in what to look for in an IT support contract.

Questions to ask before comparing quotes

1. Is this per user or per device, and what exactly counts as a device?
2. What is excluded? Please list it.
3. Does "security" include managed EDR, email filtering and MFA enforcement, or antivirus only?
4. Are on-site visits included, capped or billable?
5. What are the support hours, and what does out-of-hours cost?
6. What is the SLA by priority level, and is it in the contract? See what an IT support SLA is.
7. Is backup included, and does that mean monitored and restore-tested?
8. Are Microsoft 365 licences passed through at cost?
9. What is the minimum term, notice period and renewal mechanism?
10. Who owns documentation and admin credentials on exit?

A provider who answers these clearly is usually a provider whose invoices will not surprise you.

What to do next

Get a number for your own setup. The IT support cost calculator takes your headcount and equipment and returns an indicative monthly figure using the per-device rates above in a couple of minutes. It is followed by a short scoping call so the estimate can be confirmed against what you actually run, and so the exclusions are agreed before anything is signed.