Decking Cost in Ireland: Timber vs Composite, Priced Properly

Last updated: 17 August 2026 · By Mossy Tariq, Founder — Property Blueprint Co.

Every decking quote in Ireland is written as a rate per square metre, and that rate describes the part of the deck you can see. The boards are roughly a third of the work. Underneath them sit the ground preparation, the footings, the bearers, the joists and the drainage — the lines that decide whether the deck is level in five years or lifting at one corner after the second winter.

The result is a market where the decking cost quoted for the same 20 square metre deck can differ by €1,600 with no visible difference in the finished surface. The gap is almost never in the boards. It is in what the cheaper installer assumed about the ground.

A deck is priced by its boards and destroyed by its sub-frame. The half you cannot see decides both.

What follows breaks the price into parts a homeowner can compare: the bands by material, the sub-frame beneath them, the ownership arithmetic separating timber from composite, and the planning rule that catches raised decks. The figures are indicative Irish market ranges for 2026, drawn from current Irish installer and supplier pricing — a baseline to measure a real quote against, not a quote in themselves.

How much does decking cost in Ireland in 2026

A decking cost in Ireland in 2026 is three numbers stacked on top of each other: a board rate, a sub-frame rate, and a ground-preparation rate. A quote giving only the first is describing a third of the job.

For a straightforward deck on level, stable ground, supplied and installed, the market sits roughly like this: pressure-treated softwood €80 to €120 per square metre, composite €65 to €170 depending on board grade, and hardwood such as iroko €120 to €180. On a typical 20 square metre suburban deck that puts the finished figure between €1,600 and €3,600 before the ground is counted.

The ground is where the range widens. Levelling, sub-base and drainage add €50 to €100 per square metre on difficult sites — a sloping garden, soft or waterlogged soil, or a deck raised to meet a door threshold. That is not a premium for a better deck; it is the cost of making the site capable of holding any deck, and it is the most common exclusion in a low quote. The wider budget this sits inside is in the whole-garden cost guide for Ireland, and the ground works are priced in the cost to level a garden.

What does timber decking cost compared with composite

The two materials load their cost at different ends of the project. Timber is cheap to buy and expensive to keep; composite is expensive to buy and close to free to keep. Which is correct depends on how long you intend to own the deck.

Pressure-treated softwood is the volume option at roughly €80 to €120 per square metre supplied and installed. It is the cheapest way to get a usable deck, and the material that will look tired first in an Irish garden, because the boards spend most of the year damp.

Composite runs from around €65 to €170 per square metre supplied and installed, the boards alone accounting for €35 to €90 and installation adding €30 to €80. The spread is wide because the category is wide: an entry-level hollow board and a capped co-extruded board are both sold as composite and behave nothing alike after five Irish winters.

Hardwood such as iroko or balau sits at €120 to €180 per square metre supplied and installed. The timber costs more and is denser to work, so the labour line rises with the material line rather than staying flat.

The variable nobody quotes is exposure. Ireland's maritime climate, described by Met Éireann, keeps external timber wet for long stretches of the year, and persistent damp grows the algae that makes a timber deck slippery and grey. That is a maintenance schedule rather than a defect, and it is why the two materials converge in cost over time.

Why is the sub-frame the half of the quote nobody prices

Because it is invisible the day the deck is finished and decisive every year afterwards. A deck is a suspended floor built outdoors: it carries load, moves with moisture, and sits over ground that either drains or does not.

The mechanism is straightforward. Joists spaced too far apart deflect between spans, so the boards flex underfoot and the fixings work loose. Footings bearing on topsoil rather than a compacted base settle unevenly, so the deck tilts and the door threshold it was built to meet stops lining up. A deck laid tight to the ground with no ventilation gap holds moisture against the underside of every joist, which is where rot starts, out of sight, years before anything shows on the surface.

That is why a decking quote should itemise six things, and why one that itemises a single rate should be read as incomplete rather than cheap.

1. Site clearance and levelling. Confirm what is removed, how the ground is levelled, and whether spoil removal and skip hire sit inside the price.
2. Sub-base and drainage. Establish what the deck bears on and how surface water leaves the area beneath it — on wet Irish sites this line does more for lifespan than the board choice does.
3. Footings and bearers. Ask what the posts sit on, at what spacing, and how they are fixed, because concrete pads at proper centres and timber blocks on soil are both called footings on a quote.
4. Joist specification and spacing. Get the joist centres in millimetres and check them against the board manufacturer's requirement, since composite commonly needs tighter centres than softwood.
5. Boards, fixings and the ventilation gap. Confirm the board grade by name, the fixing method, and that a ventilation gap is maintained under the deck and at its perimeter.
6. Balustrade, steps and edge detail. These are priced per linear metre and per step, which is why they fall out of a headline rate — and on a raised deck the balustrade is a regulatory item.

A quote covering those six lines can be compared against another that does. A single rate per square metre cannot, and the difference usually arrives later as a variation — the discipline set out in how to read a renovation quote in Ireland.

What does a deck cost to own over fifteen years

The purchase price is the smaller half of a timber deck's cost and almost the whole of a composite deck's. That asymmetry is arithmetic a homeowner can do before anyone quotes.

A softwood deck in an Irish garden needs washing down and re-treating on a repeating cycle to stay sound and non-slip, and boards will need replacing as they cup or split. Each cycle carries a materials cost and either a day of labour or a day of your own time. Multiply it by the years you plan to keep the deck and add it to the installed price. That is the real number. A composite deck removes most of that schedule, which is why it looks expensive against a softwood quote and stops looking expensive later.

The crossover point is personal. A household selling inside three years is buying the cheaper installed price. A household staying fifteen years is buying the lower running cost and should price the maintenance cycles in rather than treat them as a later problem. Deciding which you are, before requesting quotes, turns a preference into a costed decision.

Do you need planning permission for decking in Ireland

In most cases no, and the rule that decides it is about levels rather than area. Under Class 6 of the exempted-development classes in the Planning and Development Regulations, landscaping works within the curtilage of a house are exempted development subject to one condition: the level of the ground must not be altered by more than one metre above or below the level of the adjoining ground. A ground-level deck sits comfortably inside that. A platform raised more than a metre above the garden does not, and needs an application. Citizens Information sets out the current position.

Two related rules catch people out. If the deck is covered — a roofed pergola, a canopy, or a garden structure over it — that structure is assessed separately under the garden-structures class, where the cumulative floor-area limit rose to 30 square metres on 27 July 2026 under S.I. No. 338 of 2026. And a deck overlooking a neighbour is a planning question in practice even where it is exempt in principle.

Height brings a second obligation. Technical Guidance Document K to the Building Regulations, published by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, states that guarding should be provided to the sides of any raised floor, balcony or other place to which people have access, and may not be essential where the total difference in levels is 600 millimetres or less. Read the other way, a deck standing more than 600 millimetres above the ground it adjoins is one where a balustrade is expected rather than optional.

VAT belongs in the sum as well. Construction and landscaping services in Ireland are generally charged at the reduced 13.5% rate under Revenue's two-thirds rule, provided the materials do not exceed two-thirds of the total price. A composite deck is materials-heavy, so confirm the rate before comparing two prices — one may be quoted at 13.5% and the other at 23%. The consumer-contract framework behind any Irish build is published by the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission.

Where a decking project should start

It starts with the ground, not the boards. Confirm the levels, how water leaves the site, whether the deck will stand more than 600 millimetres above the adjoining ground, and whether anything is going over it. Those four answers set the sub-frame, the balustrade, the planning position and roughly half the price — before a board is chosen.

That order of operations is the operating principle of The 12-Phase System, Property Blueprint Co.'s framework for taking a homeowner from the first quote conversation to a finished, compliant result without paying the variation premium the unprepared homeowner pays. A deck rewards the same sequence: define the scope, price the invisible half, read the quote for exclusions, and hold the specification to sign-off. The full sequence is in the 12 phases of a renovation in Ireland.

If the cost baseline is the right first step, use the free Renovation Cost Calculator — a trade-by-trade estimate for the specific project, in under 5 minutes, before any installer has quoted.

Frequently asked questions

How much does decking cost per square metre in Ireland in 2026?

Supplied and installed on level, stable ground, pressure-treated softwood runs roughly €80 to €120 per square metre, composite €65 to €170 depending on board grade, and hardwood such as iroko €120 to €180. Levelling, sub-base and drainage add €50 to €100 per square metre on difficult sites. On a 20 square metre deck that puts the finished figure between roughly €1,600 and €3,600 before ground works.

Is composite decking cheaper than timber in Ireland?

Not to buy, and often yes to own. Softwood is the cheaper installed price; composite carries the lower running cost because it is washed rather than re-treated. A household selling within three years is buying the installed price; a household staying fifteen years should add the timber maintenance cycles to the softwood quote before comparing.

Do I need planning permission for decking in Ireland?

Usually no. Under Class 6 of the exempted-development classes, landscaping works within the curtilage of a house are exempted development provided the level of the ground is not altered by more than one metre above or below the adjoining ground. A ground-level deck is inside that limit; a platform raised more than a metre above the garden is not. A roof or garden structure over the deck is assessed separately, under a limit that rose to 30 square metres on 27 July 2026.

Does a raised deck need a balustrade under the Building Regulations?

Technical Guidance Document K states that guarding should be provided to the sides of any raised floor, balcony or other place to which people have access, and may not be essential where the total difference in levels is 600 millimetres or less. A deck standing more than 600 millimetres above the ground it adjoins is therefore one where a balustrade is expected, and it must be specified before the quote.

What is usually left out of a cheap decking quote?

The ground preparation, the sub-base and drainage, the footing specification, the joist centres, and the balustrade and steps. A single rate per square metre almost always describes boards and labour only. Ask for the board rate and the sub-frame rate separately and compare only the second, because the board rate is public and the sub-frame rate is where quotes differ.

Why do composite boards need tighter joist spacing than timber?

Composite boards are less stiff across a span than a comparable timber board, so they deflect between joists set at timber centres. An installer working to softwood spacing produces a deck that feels soft underfoot and works its fixings loose. Ask for the joist centres in millimetres and check them against the board manufacturer's requirement before signing, because this error cannot be corrected once the boards are fixed.