Use classes group activities for planning purposes. A change within the same class is generally not development, while a change between classes may need permission or a specific permitted-development route. The classification concerns what happens at the property, not simply the name of the business. [1][2]
The classes you are likely to meet
- Class E: shops, eating-in cafés and restaurants, offices, certain indoor sport and fitness activities, medical services, nurseries and qualifying light industrial activities. The precise statutory descriptions matter: a swimming pool is not an E-class gym, for example. [3]
- Class F1: non-residential education, museums, public libraries, certain halls, places of worship and law courts. [3]
- Class F2: specified local community facilities, outdoor sport, swimming pools and skating rinks. A small shop selling mainly essential goods qualifies only where its area does not exceed 280 m² and there is no other such facility within a 1,000-metre radius. Not every small shop is F2. [3]
- Class B2: general industrial uses outside the qualifying light industrial activities in Class E. B8 covers storage and distribution, including open-air storage. [1][4]
- The C classes: C1 covers hotels; C2 residential institutions; C2A secure residential institutions; C3 dwellinghouses; and C4 specified small shared houses occupied by three to six unrelated people. The distinction depends on the actual arrangement, not just the number of bedrooms. [4]
- Sui generis: uses outside the named classes, including pubs, hot food takeaways, betting shops and other specifically excluded activities. The expression does not put these businesses into one interchangeable class. [1]
A class is not a complete permission
Class E was introduced on 1 September 2020. It allows flexibility between the activities within its definition, but it does not cancel a planning condition or legal agreement restricting a particular premises. Nor does it authorise an extension, external flue, new shopfront or advertisement simply because the business use is acceptable. [3][2]
The starting point is the lawful existing use. A letting advertisement describing a property as an office or studio is not conclusive evidence. Check the council's planning history and establish the relevant planning unit: an upper floor may belong to the shop below or may be a separate unit. [5][2]
How to classify a proposal
Prepare a short operating description before choosing an application form. Explain what customers do on site, whether food is mainly eaten there or taken away, whether people sleep there, and how storage or manufacturing relates to the main activity. Compare that description with the legislation rather than selecting the nearest familiar label. [3][1]
Where the existing position is uncertain, ask the planning authority what evidence it needs. A lawful development certificate can provide a formal decision on a sufficiently defined existing or proposed use; an informal discussion and a certificate are not the same thing. [2]
Changes being considered
On 1 September 2026, the government announced proposals for separate planning treatment of vape shops and adult gaming centres. These are proposals subject to consultation and legislative changes, not new use classes that should already be assumed in a lease or application. [6]