doodletrash00WHAT THE NEW RULES SAY
England's recycling rules changed on 31 March 2026.
Councils must now collect the same core streams from every home, flats included: food and garden waste, paper and card, other dry recyclables, and whatever is left. Here is what goes where.
Sort an item01Principles
02THE SHORT ANSWER
The rules end the patchwork of different bins.
Your council still decides the containers.
FOOD WASTE
Food waste must be collected weekly and free of charge. Households should get two bins: a small kitchen caddy and a larger outdoor bin.
Sort an itemDRY RECYCLING
Paper and card, plus glass, metal and plastic. Food and drink cartons go in the plastic stream, not with the cardboard.
What goes whereBATTERIES
Batteries and electricals are not part of the kerbside streams. Binned batteries caused over 1,200 fires in bin lorries and waste sites in a year.
See the numbers03A QUICK SORTING CHECK
Pick an everyday item to see where England's Simpler Recycling guidance puts it. The bar shows how firmly the rules expect councils to collect it from your door.
Based on GOV.UK guidance for councils on Simpler Recycling. Your council's leaflet or website has the final word on containers and collection days.
04TWO NUMBERS WORTH KNOWING
One figure on how much England recycles,
one on what happens when batteries are binned.
43.7%
Waste from households recycled, 2024/25
England's official household recycling rate was 43.7% in 2024/25, down 0.3 percentage points on 44.0% the year before. Households produced 21.9 million tonnes of waste.
RECYCLING RATE · DEFRA
1,200+ a year
Battery fires in bin lorries and waste sites
A 2024 survey of councils, scaled up across the UK, estimated over 1,200 battery fires in bin lorries and waste sites in a year, up 71% from 700 in 2022.
BIN FIRES · MATERIAL FOCUS
The government's target is to recycle 65% of municipal waste by 2035. WRAP says most households put at least two recyclable items in the bin each week because of confusion.
05FOUR HABITS TO TRY
The streams are the same everywhere, but the containers are not. These habits work whichever bins your council gives you.
Peelings, plate scrapings and windfall fruit go in the food waste, which must be collected every week for free.
Juice and milk cartons belong in the plastics stream, not the paper and card.
Leave lids on glass jars; put loose metal lids in with the metal.
Remove batteries from electricals if you can and recycle both at a recycling point. If they cannot come out, recycle the whole item.
06THE BIN FIRE PROBLEM
Laptops, phones, tablets, electric toothbrushes, vapes and earbuds all hide lithium-ion batteries. Crushed or damaged in a bin lorry, they can catch fire.
A 2024 survey for Material Focus found nearly half of UK adults did not know electricals with built-in rechargeable batteries can catch fire if crushed or damaged. Its advice: never bin batteries or electricals, always recycle them.
07Questions
It is the set of rules, in force in England from 31 March 2026, that makes councils collect the same core streams from every home: food and garden waste, paper and card, other dry recyclables (glass, metal, plastic and cartons) and residual waste.
Food waste must be collected weekly and free of charge from all households, including flats. Guidance says households should get a small kitchen caddy and a larger outdoor bin. Some councils have agreed a later start date.
No. Councils only have to collect garden waste where a household has asked for the service and paid any charge. Households without it are still entitled to a free weekly food waste collection.
Not everywhere yet. Councils must collect plastic film packaging and plastic bags with the plastic recycling by 31 March 2027.
Never put them in any bin. Material Focus advises removing batteries from electricals where possible and recycling them at a recycling centre, supermarket or battery recycling point, or recycling the whole item if the battery cannot be removed.
08Sources
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