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Wills
How much does a will cost?
What firms publish for a will, what the free schemes actually cover, and the three things that decide whether the lowest price on the page is enough.
- The short answer
- What firms publish
- Single, mirror and complicated
- The free and cheap routes
- What you actually need
- What it costs afterwards
Five firms in our set publish a price for a straightforward single will. End to end, this is what they publish:
£240 to £500 for a single straightforward will, across the firms we read
That range hides the thing that matters most: one of those prices includes VAT, three add it on top, and one page does not say either way. Read the VAT column before you read the number.
Nobody has to publish a will price at all. The transparency rules that force solicitors to publish prices cover probate, not will writing. Every figure on this page is a firm choosing to put its price on the internet where anyone can hold it up. That is worth remembering the next time a firm will not give you one.
Source: every one of these is a firm's own published price page. Every row in the table links the page it was read from.
What each firm publishes for a single will
Alphabetical order. We do not rank these firms, recommend them, or call any of them cheap or dear, and the order never moves for money. Each figure is quoted from that firm's own page and stamped with the day we read it.
| Firm | What they publish | What kind of number | VAT | Their own page |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bindmans | £500 plus VAT | Fixed fee | plus VAT | bindmans.com |
| Needle Partners | from £250 | From (a floor) | not stated beside this figure | www.needlepartners.com |
| O'Hara Solicitors | £425 plus VAT | Fixed fee | plus VAT | oharasolicitors.co.uk |
| Owens Solicitors | from £250 plus VAT | From (a floor) | plus VAT | owensolicitors.com |
| Stewart & Bennett | £240 including VAT | Fixed fee | inclusive of VAT | www.stewartbennett.com |
Two of those are published as a floor rather than a price, which means the bill starts there and goes up. One is inclusive of VAT and is still the lowest figure in the table after the others have had VAT added to them. None of these is a quote for your will, and none of them is a promise.
Single, mirror and complicated
A single will is one person, one document, one straightforward estate. It is the only kind of will that enough firms publish a price for, so it is the only one we can put a range on, and it is the table above.
Mirror wills are two nearly identical wills, usually for a couple, each leaving everything to the other and then to the same people. Firms price them as a pair, and the pair is not two singles. One firm in the table above publishes both, which is what lets you see the difference: Four hundred and twenty five plus VAT for one will, which is five hundred and ten with it. The same page lists a pair for £600 plus VAT, so the second will costs a hundred and seventy five.
That pair price, on their page: O'Hara Solicitors, read 24 September 2026.
A complicated will is trusts, business assets, property abroad, a second family, or anything likely to be argued over. We have no published price for one and we are not going to invent a range. Almost nobody publishes one, because the honest answer is that it depends on the work, and a firm that quotes you for that job without asking a great many questions first is guessing too.
Where the money in this market actually is. The will is rarely the product. A free will
offer, or one priced well under the table above, is often the way in to a trust, an executor appointment or an estate-planning package costing several thousand pounds. Sometimes that package is the right thing to buy. It is never the thing you came in for, and you are allowed to go away and think about it.
The routes that cost little or nothing
Two national schemes put a solicitor-written will within reach of people who would otherwise not have one. Neither is a trick, and both publish exactly who they are for, which is the part that usually gets left off.
Will Aid, one will
£120 suggested donation for a single basic will, with the solicitor waiving their feeWho it is for: Anyone, in November, at a participating solicitor. The solicitor waives their fee and you are invited to donate to Will Aid instead. It covers a basic will; anything complicated is likely to be quoted separately. Appointments go early because the scheme runs for one month a year.
Source: Will Aid, read 24 September 2026.
The same scheme covers a couple as well: £200 suggested donation for a pair of basic mirror wills. It runs 1 November 2026 to 30 November 2026, and appointments go early because it is one month a year.
Free Wills Month
Free for anyone aged 55 or over, in selected locationsWho it is for: Members of the public aged 55 and over, in the locations taking part, while the campaign is running. It covers a simple will, written or updated. The charities taking part pay the solicitor, and you are not obliged to leave any of them anything, although the whole point of the scheme is that some people will choose to. If you are under 55 or outside the areas covered, this route is not open to you.
Source: Free Wills Month, read 24 September 2026.
Free, if you are 55 or over and in one of the areas taking part. Charities pay the solicitor, because some people who write a will this way choose to leave them something. You are not obliged to, and they say so themselves. Knowing who is paying does not make it a worse deal. It makes it an understandable one.
What you actually need
Most people asking this question want one straightforward will, and the honest steer is that the document is usually the cheap part. Three things decide whether a two hundred pound will is enough:
- Who inherits, and are they obvious. Everything to a spouse and then to the children is the case the standard price is written for.
- Whether anything is held in a way a will cannot reach. A jointly owned home, a pension with a nomination on it and a life policy in trust do not pass under a will at all, and a will that assumes they do is a will that goes wrong.
- Whether anybody is likely to challenge it. A second family, an estranged child or a promise made and not written down is where the money goes, and it goes there years later.
The way a cheap will most often turns expensive
Two witnesses, both over 18, both with a clear view of you signing, and neither of them, nor their husband or wife, left anything in the will. Get that wrong and the will can fail, and the people who find out are your family, years later, when nothing can be done about it.
That is the wording published for England and Wales, and it states 2 witnesses, both over 18, both watching you sign, and neither of them inheriting anything.
Source: GOV.UK, read 24 September 2026.
The guidance published for Northern Ireland says the same thing in its own words, and adds one line worth having: a video recording is not a valid will. It states 2 witnesses, both present with you when you sign, and neither of them inheriting anything.
Source: nidirect, read 24 September 2026.
Two nations, two pages, the same rule. We have not read the Scottish wording, which comes from a different body of law, so nothing here is offered as a rule for Scotland.
The will is not the expensive part
A will is a few hundred pounds. Winding up the estate it governs is a different order of money altogether, and that is the bill your family gets rather than you. The court charges £526 to grant probate in England and Wales, the same figure whatever the estate is worth, and firms publish their own prices for the work on top of it.
Source: HM Courts and Tribunals Service, read 24 September 2026.
The second thing to know about that bill is that some firms price it as a share of the estate rather than as a price for the work, and the paperwork does not get harder because somebody owned a bigger house.
Questions people ask
How much does a will cost in the UK?
The firms on this page publish between two hundred and forty pounds and five hundred pounds for a straightforward single will. One of those figures includes VAT, three add it on top and one page does not say, so the real spread is wider than it looks. Will prices are not covered by the transparency rules, so these are firms choosing to publish rather than a market average.
Can I write my own will?
Yes. There is no legal requirement to use a solicitor. The risk is not the writing, it is the signing and the wording: a will that is witnessed wrongly, or that tries to leave something that does not pass under a will at all, can fail years later when nobody can fix it.
Is a free will really free?
The two national schemes on this page are real, and both publish who they are for. Will Aid asks for a voluntary donation to charity instead of a fee. Free Wills Month is paid for by charities hoping some people will leave them something, and they say so themselves. A free will offered by a firm outside those schemes is usually a way in to something dearer, which does not make it dishonest, only worth reading carefully.
Do mirror wills cost twice as much as one will?
No. Firms that publish a pair price charge less than double, because the second document is largely the first one again. A pair is still two separate wills and either person can change theirs afterwards.