Class R Permitted Development: A Guide for Farm Buildings
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Class R Eligibility Checklist
Unlike Class Q, at the time of writing, Class R is not excluded from National Landscapes or conservation areas. If your barn sits in a protected landscape where Class Q is off the table, Class R may still be open to you.
This article covers what Class R is and what you have to do to use it. It also looks at where Class R is the better route than Class Q.
If you're considering residential conversion instead, that's Class Q. We've written a separate guide.
Why apply for a Change of Use Under Class R?
For many agricultural estates, a change of use for a previously redundant structure can create a form of financial diversification provision for the agricultural estate.
In May 2024, Class R was revised, enabling farmers, landowners and developers to convert unused agricultural buildings to commercial spaces, without the need to submit a full planning application.
If you are considering doing some residential work, then you would need to look at Class Q, for which we have written a guide.
What Class R permits
Under Class R, farm buildings can be converted into flexible commercial spaces, such as:
Shops
Cafes
Hotel and Guest Accommodation
Offices
Lerissure or recreational facilities
This unlocks the opportunities to use neglected buildings on your farm for innovative and profitable new purposes. Depending on how the estate is run, some of these uses are more passive than others; storage or office space asks far less of your time than a cafe or a shop. The right use is the one that fits how the farm already works.
What you actually have to do
Under 150m², you notify the council before the use begins. Above that, up to 1,000m², you face a prior approval test — but only on a narrow set of matters: transport, noise, contamination and flooding. There are several criteria to get right first.
Conclusion
Class R gives you the change of use and nothing else. It permits no building works at all; no new openings, no shopfront, no flue, no fire strategy, no insulation. Every one of those is a separate consent and, before that, a design problem.
So the right question isn't whether you qualify on paper. It's whether the building you've actually got can take the use you have in mind. A barn can be the perfect candidate for a use class and still be unfit for it, wrong structure, wrong access, no realistic route to building regs. The notification won't tell you that, which is why you will need to work with a capable architect and structural engineer who understands the sector.
