How much does microcement cost?

Microcement is a premium finish, and the question everyone wants answered up front is “what will it cost me?” The honest answer is that microcement is quoted per project, because the price depends on several factors that vary from job to job. What this guide does is explain exactly how installers build a quote, so you can judge whether the numbers you are given are fair. Across the quotes we have reviewed, the cheapest line on the page is rarely the cheapest job once it is finished.

Note: microcement is priced locally and varies by region and installer. Use this guide to understand the drivers of cost, and always get itemised quotes for your specific project.

Microcement is priced per square metre, supply-and-fit

Almost all professional microcement work is priced per square metre, supply-and-fit. That single headline rate bundles the material, the primer, the coats, the sealer and the labour into one number, then flexes around the realities of your job. Two projects of identical size can be quoted very differently depending on what sits underneath and what finish you want on top.

Some installers split the quote into supply and labour separately, which is useful because it shows you where the money actually goes. Material is a minor share. The bulk is skilled time. When a quote comes back as a flat per-m² figure with nothing itemised, that is not wrong, but it gives you less to compare against the next quote. Ask for the breakdown either way.

A handful of jobs are priced as a day rate rather than per m², usually very small or very awkward ones where measuring by area would underprice the effort. If you are quoted a day rate, ask roughly how many days, so you can sanity-check it against the area.

The cost drivers that move a quote up or down

The same product, the same room size, and yet two quotes land far apart. That gap is almost always explained by the drivers below. Understanding them lets you read a quote instead of just reacting to the total.

Cost driver	Effect on price	Why
Total area	Larger area, lower rate per m²	Fixed setup costs spread further
Floor vs wall	Floors usually cost more	Mesh, thicker build-up, harder sealer
Substrate condition	Poor substrate raises price	Levelling and repair before any coats
Number of coats	More coats, higher cost	More material and more labour days
Colour and finish	Bespoke colours add cost	Tinting, samples, matching effort
Wet areas	Showers and wet rooms add cost	Tanking membrane and wet-area sealer
Access and location	Awkward sites raise price	Slower work, travel, parking, carrying
Timeline pressure	Tight deadlines can add cost	Overtime or reshuffled scheduling

Of these, surface condition and preparation are the ones people underestimate most. A flat, sound, dry substrate is quick to prime and crack on with. A floor that flexes, a wall with old adhesive ridges, or tiles that are drumming and loose all need fixing first, and that remedial work is real labour with its own cost. Preparation is often the hidden bulk of a quote, and a low quote that skips it is borrowing trouble.

Indicative cost by room and surface

The table below is a relative guide, not a price list. Microcement is quoted per project and the rate per square metre varies widely by region and installer, so use this to understand which jobs carry a higher or lower rate, then get itemised quotes for real figures.

Project	What it covers	Relative cost per m²
Bathroom walls	Walls only, standard prep	Higher: small area, fixed setup
Bathroom floor	Floor with mesh and wet-area sealer	Higher: wet-area sealing
Full bathroom	Walls, floor, shower, tanking	Highest: tanking and detail
Kitchen worktop	Small area, high finish standard	High: unforgiving finish
Living or hall floor	Larger continuous floor area	Lower: rate drops with area
Whole-home floors	Multiple rooms, one continuous finish	Lowest: economies of scale

A few patterns hold even without firm numbers. A small bathroom almost always carries the highest rate per m², because the setup, priming, mixing and sealing effort is the same whether the wall is two metres or twenty. A large open floor carries the lowest rate per m², because the team gets into a rhythm and the fixed costs disappear into a bigger area. Wet rooms cost more than dry rooms of the same size, because of the tanking layer and the wet-area sealer. A worktop looks cheap on area but the finish standard is unforgiving, so the rate per m² is high.

Why microcement costs what it does: labour over material

It is tempting to compare microcement to paint or tiles and conclude it is expensive. But the cost is almost entirely labour and skill, not material. A microcement finish is built up in several thin, hand-trowelled coats, each needing time to cure before the next, and the final look depends on the applicator’s technique. You are paying for craftsmanship as much as for product.

Put rough proportions on it and the point lands. On a typical job the material is a small slice of the total, and the rest is labour, preparation and the sealing system. That ratio is exactly why a cheaper bag of product does almost nothing to the final price. The hours are the price.

This is also why low quotes deserve scrutiny. The usual ways to shave a price are to skip preparation, cut a coat, or swap in a budget sealer. None of those show up on day one. They show up months later as patchiness, hairline cracking, or a floor that wears thin where everyone walks. A quote that is meaningfully below the others is usually telling you which corner is about to be cut.

Where microcement actually saves money

Although the finish is premium, the whole project can be more competitive than the headline rate suggests. Because microcement is applied over existing tiles, concrete or screed, you often avoid a long list of tear-out costs:

• Demolition and removal of the old surface.
• Skip hire and waste disposal.
• Making good the substrate after a strip-back.
• Replacing fixtures disturbed by removal.
• The downtime of a full strip-back.

For a tired tiled bathroom, going over the top with microcement can work out comparably to a full re-tile once those removal costs are counted, with a more modern, seamless result and no grout lines to scrub. The saving is largest where the existing surface is sound but dated, because you keep the substrate and only pay for the new finish.

There is a second saving that is easy to miss. Microcement is continuous, so there is no tile wastage, no cut offcuts, and no need to over-order by a percentage for breakages and future repairs. With tiles you routinely buy more than you fit. With microcement you pay for the area you have.

Microcement vs epoxy and polished concrete on cost

These three finishes get cross-shopped constantly, and on cost they behave differently.

• Polished concrete needs a thick concrete slab and heavy grinding and polishing equipment. Where you already have a suitable slab, it can be economical. Where you do not, pouring and curing a new slab is a major cost and a structural decision, which pushes it well above microcement for most retrofits.
• Epoxy resin is often cheaper per m² than microcement for plain industrial-style floors, and it goes down fast. It is less decorative, the colour range and texture are more limited, and it can yellow under sunlight, so the lower price comes with finish trade-offs.
• Microcement is thin, light and goes over almost any sound substrate, walls included, which polished concrete and most epoxy systems cannot match. That flexibility is why it often wins on total project cost even when its per-m² rate looks higher, because it removes the demolition and slab work the others may require.

The honest summary is that no one of them is simply cheapest. The cheapest finish is the one that matches your existing substrate with the least preparation, and that depends entirely on what you are starting with.

How to read and compare quotes

To compare quotes fairly, ask each installer to itemise the same things, so you are comparing like for like rather than guessing at what is included:

1. Preparation and priming, including any levelling or repair.
2. Base and finish coats, and how many of each.
3. Waterproofing or tanking for any wet areas.
4. Sealer type and number of sealer coats.
5. Total area and the per-m² rate.
6. Number of working days and the disruption that implies.

A clear, itemised quote tells you a lot about how seriously an installer takes preparation, which is the single biggest predictor of a finish that lasts. When I compare two quotes, the first thing I look for is whether preparation is a real line with a real cost. If it is missing or suspiciously small, the rest of the number is unreliable. The second thing I check is the sealer, because a vague “sealed on completion” with no product named is where quality quietly disappears.

Be wary of comparing a per-m² rate in isolation. A higher rate that includes proper tanking and two sealer coats can be cheaper, and far better, than a lower rate that quietly leaves both out.

Budgeting beyond the headline rate

When you set a budget, look past the per-square-metre figure and account for the parts of a job that are easy to forget. Preparation is the big one: if the existing surface needs levelling, crack repair or stabilising, that work happens before any microcement goes on and can be a meaningful share of the total. Wet areas add a tanking membrane and a wet-area sealer. And because microcement cures between coats, you are also budgeting for time, the room may be out of action for several days to a week, which matters if it is your only bathroom or kitchen.

A few more line items belong in a realistic budget:

• Removing or protecting fixtures, fittings and flooring at the edges of the work.
• Reinstating skirting, trims and any sanitaryware afterwards.
• A maintenance allowance for resealing, sooner on floors than on walls.
• Sample pots or a small test area if you want to approve the exact colour first.

It is also worth factoring in the long-term cost, which is where microcement quietly does well. The sealer is a maintenance item that can be refreshed rather than replaced, so unlike tiles or laminate there is rarely a “rip it out and start again” bill down the line. Spread over the life of the surface, a premium finish that can be renewed in place often compares favourably to cheaper finishes that need full replacement.

The bottom line

Microcement sits at the premium end of decorative finishes, priced per square metre and driven mainly by area, surface preparation, finish and wet-area requirements. The material is a small part of the bill; the value is in skilled labour. Judge quotes on what they include, especially preparation and sealing, rather than on headline price alone, and get specific quotes for your project before you commit a budget. The right number is the one that pays for the preparation and the sealer properly, because that is the part you cannot see and the part that decides how long the finish lasts.