Cost of painting a ceiling: price per m2 and extras

The national market guide for a ceiling is from €18 per m2, just above a wall. That is because you work above your head, with scaffolding or a mobile tower in a taller room, and because mistakes show up so well in raking light.

A ceiling is easy to measure: length times width, the same as the floor of the room. As an example on the from-price: a ceiling of 25 m2 comes to from €450. If lining paper has to go on first, that is 25 times from €15, so from €375 on top, together from €825.

These are lower limits. Spotlights, beams, a sloping section or a high open void are not counted in a sum like this, and neither is the work around them. Even so, this measurement is handy for checking quotes: does the number of square metres someone writes down match what you measure?

With a window in the long wall, daylight skims along your ceiling. Every join, every old repair and every small bump then becomes visible. That is also why many people see streaks after a DIY round, even though it looked fine on the day.

On a ceiling without streaks we explain how that happens: work quickly and wet on wet, without an edge drying. In a room with lots of light that takes more attention, in the preparation too. So at the site visit we also look at how the light falls in your room.

Small cracks often come back if you only paint over them. Lining paper (renovlies) or glass fibre hides those small cracks, and you then paint over it. On applying lining paper (renovlies) you can read how that works.

With a stain from an earlier leak, paint alone is not enough: the spot first has to be sealed with a stain-blocking primer, otherwise the stain comes through. And if there is already a lot of paint on the ceiling, the old layer can come loose under a new coat. We try that out on a small area beforehand too, so you are not faced with a surprise later.

• the length and width of the room, and the height of the ceiling;
• a photo of the ceiling, preferably in daytime with the window in view;
• photos of cracks and stains, with a hand or pen in the picture for scale;
• whether there are spotlights, beams or a sloping section;
• whether the room is empty, or whether furniture will stay.

If you have had a leak, say whether it has been fixed. There is little point painting over a spot that still gets wet. You want to know that before you sign a quote.

An even ceiling in an empty new-build room is a very different job from an old ceiling in a lived-in living room, even with the same number of square metres. This makes the difference:

• the surface: textured plaster, plasterboard, old paint or wood;
• the height: with an open void or open ridge, scaffolding goes up first;
• joins: crisp lines along coloured walls need more masking;
• the number of coats, depending on the colour underneath.

A wooden ceiling, for example under a canopy, is lacquer work and so a different story from wall paint. If that canopy is outdoors, you plan it as exterior work, around the dry days on our painting weather page.

In Workum we did an interior renovation from ceiling to skirting boards, with the ceiling done along with the rest. The ceilings were also part of a new-build home that was delivered move-in ready. Feel free to ask what we would do with your ceiling; sometimes a good coat is enough and you do not need lining paper (renovlies). Honest advice is also what customers mention in their reviews, and on Google we are rated 4.8 from 25 reviews.

If you want to combine this with the walls, also look at what interior painting costs. A whole room is usually more practical than only the ceiling.

Send a photo of your ceiling and the measurements of the room, and we will plan the site visit. You then get a fixed price for the agreed work, and the arrangement for when we need the room.

The amounts on this page are a national market guide, not prices from MJA Allround Bouw. Source: Werkspot, Trustoo, Homedeal and Slimster, as of October 2026.