Section 21 notices after 1 May 2026: what changed (England)

Does this apply to you?

Three facts decide where a section 21 notice stands:

• Who your landlord is. Private tenancies moved onto the new rules on 1 May 2026. Social housing let by a housing association or other private registered provider didn’t.
• When the notice was given. A private landlord can’t give one on or after 1 May 2026. One given before then was kept alive for a limited time.
• Whether the landlord asked the court to issue a claim in time. For an older notice, this decides whether it still works or has lapsed.

This covers homes in England. Homes in Wales run on different law, the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016. Council tenancies are usually secure tenancies under different legislation, so they aren’t covered here either.

What the law says

The Renters’ Rights Act 2025 abolished section 21 for private tenancies from 1 May 2026 (S.I. 2026/421, reg. 2). Fixed-term assured shorthold tenancies were abolished too, and existing tenancies became assured periodic tenancies, which simply roll on with no end date. A private landlord now needs one of the legal reasons, called grounds, in Schedule 2 to the Housing Act 1988, served by a section 8 notice on the prescribed form. If the tenant doesn’t leave, the landlord has to go to court, and there is always a hearing. The accelerated procedure that went with section 21 isn’t available for these claims.

Notices given before 1 May 2026

Schedule 6 to the Act kept older notices alive for a limited time (Renters’ Rights Act 2025, Sch. 6). For a section 21 notice, the landlord had to ask the court to issue a claim within the notice’s applicable period. That period ended on the earlier of:

• six months beginning with the date the notice was given; and
• 31 July 2026, three months beginning with 1 May 2026.

Where the notice had to give a date more than two months after it was served, for example on some periodic tenancies, the first limb is four months beginning with the date specified in the notice instead (Housing Act 1988, s.21(4EA), as substituted).

If the claim was requested in time, the notice stays valid until the court proceedings finish, with no deadline. Until then the reforms don’t apply to that tenancy: it stays an assured shorthold tenancy, and the old law applies in full, including the procedure the claim was brought under.

If it wasn’t, the notice stopped being valid at the end of its applicable period and can’t be used to start proceedings. The tenancy moved onto the new rules at that point. A landlord in that position has to start again with a section 8 notice on a ground.

Housing association and other social housing

The reforms haven’t been brought into force for social housing assured tenancies with a housing association or other private registered provider. The old law still applies to them in full, including section 21 where the tenancy is an assured shorthold tenancy. The government says the new rules will apply to these tenancies from October 2027, but the regulations to do that haven’t been made, so for now it is a stated intention, not law.

Where an old-rules section 21 notice still counts

For a claim preserved in time, or a section 21 notice from a housing association, the notice is valid only if the landlord met each condition when it was given, tested against the law as it stood then. The main ones:

• Notice period. In writing, and at least two months’ notice (Housing Act 1988, s.21).
• The form. For a home in England, the prescribed form is Form 6A. A notice on a different form is a point to examine, not automatically invalid on that alone.
• Four-month bar. No notice in the first four months of the tenancy, counted from the start of the original tenancy where it was renewed. This doesn’t apply to a statutory periodic tenancy.
• Deposit. Where a deposit was paid, no notice while it wasn’t held in an authorised scheme, while the scheme’s initial requirements hadn’t been met, or before the prescribed information about it was given. These bars fall away once the deposit is returned or a court application about it has been decided, withdrawn or settled (Housing Act 2004, s.215, as it stood before 1 May 2026).
• Gas safety record and energy performance certificate. No notice while the landlord hadn’t given the tenant a copy of each (s.21A).
• How to Rent guide. No notice while the landlord hadn’t given the version then in effect (s.21B). This doesn’t apply where the landlord is a housing association or other private registered provider.
• Banned fees. No notice while a payment banned by the Tenant Fees Act 2019, or a holding deposit kept in breach of it, hadn’t been repaid (Tenant Fees Act 2019, s.17).
• Retaliatory eviction. No notice within six months of the council serving an improvement notice or emergency remedial action notice on the home. A notice can also be invalid where it followed a written complaint about the home’s condition that the landlord didn’t answer properly within 14 days and the council then acted on (Deregulation Act 2015, s.33). There are exceptions, and this protection never applies where the landlord is a housing association or other private registered provider.
• Licensing. No notice while the home was an unlicensed house in multiple occupation, or unlicensed under a selective licensing scheme, where a licence was required (Housing Act 2004, ss.75 and 98).

This list isn’t complete. Other rules can also affect a section 21 notice, so meeting everything above doesn’t on its own make a notice valid.

Key dates and deadlines

Every applicable period for a section 21 notice given before 1 May 2026 has now ended, so the only old notices still in play are ones where a claim was requested in time.

What people in this situation usually do next

Most people start by working out which rules apply, because everything else follows from that. Where a private landlord’s section 21 notice has lapsed, or was given after 1 May 2026, many tell the landlord in writing that it can’t be used. Where a claim was started in time, the court papers set the dates, and the section 21 conditions above are where most cases turn. There is free help at court on the day from a duty adviser.