Caravans

 

Few things in planning are as widely misunderstood as the humble caravan. People assume that because a caravan has wheels and is not a building, it slips outside planning control. It does not. The structure is rarely the point: planning permission for a caravan turns almost entirely on the use of the land it sits on, and that is where most people come unstuck.

This page is the overview. It explains what counts as a caravan in law and the one question that decides almost every case, then points you to the deeper guidance on gardens, the 28-day rule, when a caravan becomes a building, and how to prove a use is lawful. It deals with England. Wales and Scotland now use the same definition of a caravan, but the rest of the planning system there is their own, so do not read this across.

 

 

What counts as a caravan in law?

 

The definition comes from section 29(1) of the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960: a caravan is any structure designed or adapted for human habitation that is capable of being moved from one place to another, whether towed or transported, plus any motor vehicle so designed. It expressly excludes railway rolling stock on rails, and tents.

Section 13 of the Caravan Sites Act 1968 then adds the twin-unit: a structure built in no more than two sections, assembled on site by bolts or clamps, and still physically capable of being moved by road once assembled, even if it could not lawfully be moved on a highway in one piece. This is how most modern static caravans and park homes qualify.

Whether a structure passes as a caravan comes down to three tests, which run through everything on this topic:

• size: for a twin-unit in England, no more than 20 metres long, 6.8 metres wide and 3.05 metres internal height
• construction: built in no more than two sections and assembled on site
• mobility: physically capable of being moved when assembled; it is the structure that must be movable, not the route to the site

Pass all three and you have a caravan, a chattel, not a building. Fail any one and the structure is something else in law, usually a building, and the rules change completely. We work through that on is a caravan a building?

 

The question that decides almost everything: use of the land

 

This is the point everyone misses. Placing a caravan on land is not itself development, because a caravan is not a building and stationing it is not an operation. What can require permission is a material change in the use of the land, and that is judged on the facts, not on the object.

Park a touring caravan on your drive between holidays and nothing has changed: the land is still the garden of your house. Move a family into a static caravan on a field and live there, and the use of that field has changed from agriculture, or from nothing, to residential. The first needs no permission; the second does. Almost every caravan question resolves to this single test: has the use of the land materially changed?

 

A caravan in your garden

 

A caravan kept within the curtilage of your house, used for purposes incidental to the enjoyment of the home, does not need planning permission. That is the effect of section 55(2)(d) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, and it covers the things that serve a house: storage, a hobby, somewhere to work. 

Somebody living in the caravan is a different question, and section 55(2)(d) does not answer it. Living accommodation is part of the ordinary use of a home, not something incidental to it. An annexe for a relative can still be perfectly lawful, but for a different reason: if the relative stays part of your household, sharing the kitchen, the washing and the daily comings and goings, the house and the caravan remain one home. Nothing has changed, so nothing needs permission. The line is crossed when the caravan becomes a separate home with its own household living self-containedly in it. That is a material change of use and does need permission, however modest the caravan.

The words matter here, because they are not interchangeable. A use that is incidental serves the house without being part of living in it. A use that is ancillary is part of living in it, but part of the one household. Only the first comes from section 55(2)(d). The second works because nothing has changed at all. We set both out, with the cases behind them, on caravans in a garden or annexe.

 

Caravans on farms and rural land

 

Using agricultural land as a caravan site is a change of use in its own right: keeping animals or growing crops does not carry residential caravans with it. A Surrey soft fruit farm found this out in Hall Hunter Partnership v First Secretary of State [2006] EWHC 3482 (Admin). It housed 230 seasonal workers in 45 caravans, the council served an enforcement notice, and the farm lost. Its argument was that the caravans were covered by the permitted development right for farm worker accommodation described below. The court held they were not: the caravans came off the land each winter, but the paths, drains and services all stayed, so the land never stopped being a caravan site, and workers housed there for nine or ten months of the year were not there for “a particular season”. There is no permitted development right that simply lets you live in a caravan on a field.

 

The 28-day rule, and other temporary rights

 

Land can be used for many temporary purposes for a limited number of days each year without a planning application, under Part 4 of the General Permitted Development Order. It is widely misunderstood, and since July 2023 it does almost nothing for caravans at all: the right no longer covers putting any caravan on the land, with one narrow exception for a motorhome or campervan at a festival. We explain exactly what it does and does not cover on the 28-day rule and caravans.

 

When you don’t need permission

 

Part 5 of the General Permitted Development Order 2015 grants a limited right to use land as a caravan site, but only in the specific circumstances where the 1960 Act says a site licence is not required: land within the curtilage of a house, building and engineering sites, forestry and agricultural workers’ accommodation of a defined kind, travelling showpeople, sites run by exempted organisations, and so on. It is a narrow list, and the right ends, with the caravans removed, as soon as those circumstances cease. We cover the detail on our Part 5, Class A page.

 

Site licences are a separate matter

 

Planning permission and a caravan site licence are two different consents. Permission deals with the use of the land; the site licence, issued by the council under the 1960 Act, deals with how the site is laid out and run: spacing, drainage, fire safety. You generally need the planning permission first; the licence follows, and its conditions cannot override what the permission allows. Getting one does not remove the need for the other.

 

Proving a use is lawful, and enforcement

 

Where a caravan use is genuinely lawful, either because it is incidental or because it has gone unchallenged long enough, you can put the matter beyond doubt with a lawful development certificate rather than leaving it to argument. And if a council takes enforcement action, the notice has to target the right breach or it can fail. Both are covered on caravan lawful development certificates and enforcement. For the wider picture, covering contravention notices, enforcement notices and how to appeal them, time limits, and stop notices, see our planning enforcement guide.

 

Should you apply?

 

If the caravan is genuinely incidental to your home, you do not need permission and applying only invites conditions you did not have before. If you are placing a caravan for someone to live in, whether on a field, in the garden as a separate home, or to house workers, permission is not optional, and going without it risks an enforcement notice requiring the caravan’s removal, which is difficult to resist once the change of use is established. Where the position is genuinely uncertain, a lawful development certificate is the safer route than assuming and being wrong.

If a council refuses an application, you can appeal to the Planning Inspectorate. Our guide to planning appeals explains how and the deadlines that apply. There is a fee for a lawful development certificate: a certificate for an existing use is charged at the same rate as a full planning application, and one for a proposed use at half that. Fees are set nationally and change from time to time, so check our planning application fees page.

 

 

Caravans relevant legislation

 

The primary sources below are on legislation.gov.uk. Check the “Changes to Legislation” panel at the top of each page for any amendments not yet incorporated into the revised text.

• Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960: definition of a caravan (s29), site licensing
• Caravan Sites Act 1968: twin-unit caravans and dimensions (s13)
• Town and Country Planning Act 1990, s55: meaning of development; s55(2)(d) curtilage exemption
• GPDO 2015, Schedule 2, Part 5: permitted use of land as a caravan site

Other Caravan Sections

 

 

 

 

Caravan Planning Permission Page Updated: 8th August 2026