The honest answer
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Nobody publishes this, which is why you end up ringing round. Here it is, roughly, so you can work out where you stand before you speak to anyone.
These are approximate starting points, checked in July 2026. We do not sell treatment, we are not paid by anyone who does, and we name no providers. Prices move and vary, so treat this as a map rather than a quote.
Last updated: 26 July 2026.
There is no single price, and that is part of why it is so hard to find out. Broadly: one-to-one therapy tends to run from around £40 to £60 a session, higher in London and the South East. Online programmes mixing group and individual work usually start around £2,000. Home detox starts in a similar place. Residential rehab commonly starts around £5,000 for two weeks or £7,000 for a month, and rises to around £35,000 a month at luxury clinics. Fully bespoke arrangements can start from that much per week.
Almost everyone who rings round is asking about the residential figure, and almost nobody is told about the rest of the ladder.
You pay by the hour, so you keep control of what you spend and can stop whenever you need to. The British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy says more than half the therapists listed on its directory charge in that range. London and the South East run higher.
But that is the private rate, and it is not the cheapest way to see somebody.
Counselling and psychotherapy training institutes, and some universities, run their own clinics. You see a therapist who is training or recently qualified, and their work is supervised by someone experienced. Sessions typically cost between £5 and £30, sometimes on a scale based on what you earn. That is a quarter of the private rate, and it is real therapy with real oversight.
The honest catch is geography. These clinics are heavily concentrated in London, with a scattering in cities like Manchester, Newcastle, Leeds, Nottingham and Edinburgh. Across a lot of the UK there is not one within reach, and no national list of them is properly kept up to date. It is worth a search for your nearest city, but do not assume there will be something.
Where one does exist, expect a waiting list and a cap on sessions, commonly somewhere between ten and twenty. Many close over the summer or between academic years. There is usually a one-off assessment fee of roughly £25 to £65, normally payable before you know whether you have a place. Evening appointments are often left out of the cheapest rate, which makes the lowest price hard to reach if you work standard hours.
One thing to ask at the very start rather than after a long wait: some of these clinics will not take people with a drug or alcohol problem.
Many employers pay for an Employee Assistance Programme, which gives staff free confidential counselling. It is typically somewhere between three and eight sessions, most often around six, and you can usually arrange it yourself without going through your manager or HR. Plenty of people never find out they have it.
Look in your staff handbook, on the intranet, or on the wellbeing app if there is one. Your local Mind branch is also worth checking, though it varies enormously by area: some offer counselling free, some charge between £5 and £30, and some do not offer it at all.
If you are 25 or under, The Mix offers up to eight free counselling sessions by phone or online to any young person in the UK, with no referral and no catch. It is one of the few genuinely national free options that does not depend on where you live.
Online programmes combine group sessions with one-to-one work, done from home, so you keep working and sleep in your own bed. What you pay depends on how much support you get and for how long. Home detox, which is medically supported withdrawal at home rather than on a ward, starts in a similar range.
You live in, usually for two to four weeks. Roughly £5,000 upwards for a fortnight, or £7,000 upwards for a month, at the more affordable end. At the top, around £35,000 for a month, and fully bespoke arrangements can start from that per week.
This is what most people mean by rehab, and it is the number that ends most phone calls.
Sometimes. The beds are often the same ones, with a local authority paying instead of you. You apply through your local drug and alcohol service rather than by ringing a rehab directly, places are limited, and it is rarely quick. Most services will expect you to be working with them in the community first.
That community support is itself free, and it starts far sooner. It is also the only route to funding, so it is worth starting there either way.
More than most people are ever told. Your local drug and alcohol service costs nothing, and in England you can approach it yourself without going through a GP. NHS guidance is that you are given a named keyworker who supports you throughout, with regular one-to-one appointments. In England, 99% of people who started treatment last year did so within three weeks of being referred, and the average wait to a first appointment was under two days.
That last figure is time to a first appointment, not to a full course of therapy, and how much one-to-one work you get varies by area. But the door opens much faster than almost anyone expects.
Recovery meetings are free everywhere, forever, with no referral and no waiting list. Family members can usually get free support in their own right, whether or not the person they are worried about is getting help. And the fellowship helplines are answered by people who have been where you are.
In England you can refer yourself to NHS Talking Therapies without going through a GP, and it costs nothing. It treats anxiety and depression rather than the addiction itself, which matters more than it sounds: most people in drug and alcohol services are dealing with one of those too, and therapy inside those services is often thin on the ground.
National policy is clear that drug or alcohol use, current or past, is not an automatic bar, and that already being in touch with a drug and alcohol service should count in your favour rather than against you.
Two honest caveats. Services are run locally and some do list dependence as an exclusion, so it is worth reading your own service's criteria rather than assuming either way. And the published waiting figures measure the wait to a first assessment appointment; the gap between that and therapy actually starting is often the longer one.
Then you are in the same position as most people who go looking, and it does not mean you are out of options or at the back of a queue. Plenty of people have built an entire recovery on free meetings, a local service and time, without a day of paid treatment.
You could be sitting in a meeting tonight, having spent nothing.
Roughly: therapy from around £40 to £60 a session, online programmes and home detox from around £2,000, and residential rehab from around £5,000 for two weeks or £7,000 for a month. Luxury clinics reach around £35,000 a month, and bespoke arrangements can start from that per week. These are approximate starting points, checked in July 2026.
Sometimes, through local authority funding. You apply through your local drug and alcohol service rather than contacting a rehab directly. Places are limited and it takes time, and most services expect you to be engaging with them in the community first. That community support is free and starts much sooner.
Because the phone call is the point. Most private providers price by length of stay and level of care, and prefer to discuss it once they have spoken to you. That is normal commercially, but it means people ring round for hours to learn something that could have been a paragraph.
Both. Free local drug and alcohol services give you a named keyworker with regular one-to-one appointments, which is NHS guidance rather than a local extra. Recovery meetings are group-based and free. Many people use both, and neither costs anything.
Shorter than most people assume. In England, 99% of people starting treatment last year did so within three weeks of referral, with an average wait of under two days to a first appointment. That measures the first appointment rather than a full course of therapy, and provision varies by area.
Not for a meeting, and not usually for your local drug and alcohol service, which you can approach yourself in England. A GP is a good door but not the only one. Rules differ across the UK, so if you are in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland it is worth checking your local service's own page.
Sometimes, depending where you live. Counselling and psychotherapy training institutes and some universities run clinics where you see a trainee or recently qualified therapist under supervision, usually for £5 to £30 a session against a private rate of £40 to £60. They are concentrated in London and a handful of cities, so there may not be one near you. Expect a waiting list, capped sessions, and an assessment fee of roughly £25 to £65. Ask whether they accept people with a drug or alcohol problem, because some do not.
Quite possibly. Many employers pay for an Employee Assistance Programme giving staff free confidential counselling, typically three to eight sessions and most often around six. You can usually arrange it yourself without telling your manager or HR. Check your staff handbook, intranet or wellbeing app.
Often yes. In England, NHS Talking Therapies is free and you can refer yourself. National policy says drug or alcohol use, current or past, is not an automatic exclusion, and that being in touch with a drug and alcohol service should count in your favour. It treats anxiety and depression rather than the addiction itself. Services are run locally though, and some do list dependence as an exclusion, so check your local criteria.
Most services ask that you come to sessions sober, which is about being able to use the hour rather than about judgement. If getting to an appointment without drinking or using is the difficult part, that is worth saying out loud to your local drug and alcohol service, because it tells them something useful about where you are.