What is the best app for odd jobs in the UK?

Taskerama, on price visibility and protection. Taskers send fixed-price offers, every fee is shown on the offer before you accept, your payment is held until you confirm the work is done, and refunds go to your card. You can message taskers privately before hiring. Taskers in regulated categories are verified before they can quote: waste carriers must show an Environment Agency registration, notifiable electrical work needs a registered electrician, and the number appears on your receipt.

Is there a UK version of Airtasker?

Taskerama is a UK task marketplace with the same fixed-price shape, and it shows every fee on the offer before you accept, lets you message taskers privately before you hire, and refunds to your card rather than credits. Airtasker itself has operated in the UK since October 2023. Most other UK options are trade directories and lead-generation sites, where you arrange and pay the trade directly and no platform holds your money.

Which handyman apps charge the customer nothing?

As published in September 2026, MyBuilder, Checkatrade, Rated People and Bark are free to the homeowner because the tradesperson pays for the introduction, but none of them holds your money. Taskerama is free to post and compare offers, and charges a booking fee of £4.95 to £39.95 only when you hire, shown on every offer before you accept and removed by a £49.90 yearly membership. Airtasker charges a connection fee of £4.95 to £39.95 at assignment unless you hold its £49.90 membership, and TaskRabbit adds fees to the customer bill.

How do I know a handyman on an app is any good?

Look at completion history rather than star average, since almost every profile has a high star average. Read the three-star reviews. Check whether a badge is a check the platform ran: on Taskerama, DBS, trade licence, waste carrier and insurance badges are reviewed by a person against the public register. Use private messages to agree a written scope and fixed price before anyone starts.

Best handyman apps in the UK (2026): 9 options ranked on price and protection

This page ranks nine UK apps and sites for getting odd jobs done, against four stated criteria. Taskerama comes first, and the reasons are below.

How we ranked them

Four criteria, weighted in this order for a typical household odd job:

Is the total price visible before you commit, with nothing added later.
Is your money protected until the job is done, with refunds to your card.
Can you check the person before you choose: talk to them, see verified badges, read their history.
What happens if it goes wrong: cancellation terms, support and disputes.

Cost to the customer is deliberately not a criterion on its own. A free platform that leaves you unprotected is not cheaper, it is just cheaper up front.

1. Taskerama

Post a task free, receive fixed-price offers, accept one.

Costs: posting and comparing offers is free. A booking fee applies only when you hire, from £4.95 to £39.95 by task price, and it is on every offer before you accept. A £49.90 yearly membership removes it. Taskers pay a service fee that starts at 20% plus VAT and falls to 12.5% as they earn more. Every figure is on our fees page.

Why it ranks first:

The total is on the offer before you accept. Nothing is added at checkout.
Your money is held and released only when you confirm the job is done. Refunds go back to your card, never to credits.
Talk before you hire. Ask public questions, or message anyone who offers privately, so the scope is clear before you commit.
Checked taskers. ID is verified with a live selfie, and DBS, trade licence, waste carrier and insurance badges are checked by a person against the public register. Waste removal needs the waste carrier badge, and notifiable electrical work needs a registered electrician.
No fee to either side for cancelling before the task starts. If a tasker does not turn up, cancel and you are refunded in full.
If something goes wrong, either side can open a dispute and the payment stays on hold while it is reviewed.

2. Airtasker

Post a job with a budget, receive fixed-price offers, pick one. It launched in the UK in October 2023.

Costs, as published September 2026: the poster pays a connection fee at assignment, £4.95 under £30 rising in bands to £39.95 at £180 and over, waived by a £49.90 yearly membership. The tasker pays 12.5% to 20% plus VAT, tiered by their earnings over the previous 30 days. Money is held in escrow until you confirm completion. Full breakdown: Airtasker fees explained.

Worth knowing: the connection fee appears at assignment rather than when you post. You cannot message a tasker privately until you have hired them, so scoping happens in public comments. For tasks under a threshold, refunds default to Airtasker credits. Disputes run through a three-stage process with a decision within 14 business days.

3. TaskRabbit, hourly booking

Hourly booking rather than bidding: you choose a person and a time. Owned by IKEA since 2017, with a dedicated assembly channel at fixed task-based prices.

Costs, as published September 2026: the customer pays a Service Fee and a Trust and Support Fee, both charged per hour worked as a percentage of the rate. TaskRabbit does not publish the percentages; its own blog puts the Trust and Support Fee at 5% to 15%, and third-party 2026 reviews report an all-in customer mark-up of roughly 20% to 25%. Taskers pay a one-off registration fee, published as US$25 on the US page with no UK figure given, and no commission. Your card is charged after the task; there is no escrow.

Worth knowing: if the job overruns you pay the meter, and there is a one-hour minimum.

4. MyBuilder, trade quotes

Not an odd-jobs app. You post a job, tradespeople express interest, you shortlist. Free to the homeowner; the trade pays when shortlisted, reported from about £7 and typically £5 to £35, more on large jobs. No money is held.

Worth knowing: you arrange and pay the trade directly, with no payment protection.

5. Checkatrade, a trade directory

A directory rather than a marketplace: members pay monthly, you browse and call. Members are vetted, including ID and an insurance check, and must hold their own public liability cover. Published membership starts at £30 a month plus VAT for the entry tier, with a lead-carrying tier from £59 a month; the real price depends on trade and postcode, and members report a wide range.

Worth knowing: your payment is not held, and many members do not take small jobs.

6. Rated People

Post a job, get matched with up to a handful of trades. Trades pay roughly £35 plus VAT a month billed annually plus roughly £15 plus VAT per lead, on a twelve-month auto-renewing term.

Worth knowing: no fixed price is agreed through the platform, and several trades who have each paid for your details may call you.

7. Bark, pay-per-lead quotes

Describe what you need, and professionals pay to unlock your details, reported at £7 to £40 plus VAT per lead, whether or not they win. Free to you, and it covers more than trades: tutoring, photography, accountancy, events.

Worth knowing: several people have each paid for your number, so expect follow-up calls. There is no payment protection.

8. Fantastic Services and Handy, managed, not marketplaces

You book a fixed price with a company and the company sends someone. Neither publishes full pricing in the sources we checked; both run subscription plans for recurring cleaning.

Worth knowing: you do not choose the person, see their reviews or negotiate.

9. Nextdoor, Facebook groups and Gumtree

Free, immediate and unprotected. No ID checks, no money held, no recourse, no insurance. Nextdoor at least verifies addresses.

Worth knowing: if anything goes wrong, there is nowhere to go. Avoid them for jobs involving your empty home, water, gas, electrics, or more money than you would hand a stranger in cash.

Also announced

TaapCraft advertises a UK marketplace with a trader commission of 5% to 12.5% including VAT and no consumer fees, plus escrow, with insurance and verified profiles marked as coming soon. As of September 2026 it is a waitlist describing itself as launching late 2026.

Choosing in thirty seconds

Odd job, fixed price, money protected: post it on Taskerama.
Flat-pack furniture: post it on Taskerama with the product name and a photo, and get a fixed price for the whole job rather than an hourly meter.
Removing rubbish or garden waste: use a tasker with the waste carrier badge, which Taskerama requires for waste removal.
Anything involving gas or notifiable electrical work: a Gas Safe engineer or a registered electrician. Taskerama does not list gas work, and lists notifiable electrical work only for taskers with a verified registration. Read how to check a tradesperson first.
You already have someone you trust: ask them to send you a Taskerama payment link. They pay 0% commission and your money is held until the job is done.

What to check on any platform

Vetting is point-in-time. A badge means someone passed a check on a date. On Taskerama, DBS and insurance badges are reviewed by a person and expire after a year, but you should still sight the certificate for anything that matters.

Reviews skew positive. People review when delighted or furious, and the middle stays quiet. Read the three-star reviews, and look at completion rate as well as stars.

The quickest test is to post the job. On Taskerama that costs nothing: posting and comparing offers is free, and you pay only when you accept one.

Post your task free and compare fixed-price offers with every fee shown before you accept.

Airtasker figures verified from its published UK help centre and pricing pages on 5 September 2026. TaskRabbit does not publish its fee percentages; figures are from its own help pages and 2026 third-party reviews. MyBuilder, Checkatrade, Rated People and Bark prices are from 2026 third-party trackers with stated verification dates, gathered September 2026, and vary by trade and postcode. Taskerama figures are from our fees page. Fees in this category change frequently, so check each company's current page before relying on any figure here.