Office Pods in the UK: A Buyer's Guide to Sizes, Prices, Acoustics and Delivery

An office pod is a freestanding, enclosed booth that gives people a quiet place for calls, focused work or small meetings inside an open-plan office. Karmod International supplies four models in the UK, from the one-person Office Phone Booth at £4,450 + VAT to the XXL Meeting Pod for up to seven people at £14,950 + VAT. All four are for indoor use, arrive fully assembled and include LED lighting and a power socket / USB charging point.

What is an office pod, and what types are there?

An office pod is a room within a room: walls, roof, door and lighting in one freestanding unit on the office floor. Pods come in four broad types, set by how many people use them and what for.

Phone booths are for one person on a phone or video call. Work pods, often called focus pods, give one person space for longer, concentrated work. Small meeting pods take two to four people for one-to-ones, interviews and online meetings. Large meeting pods take a small team, up to seven people in Karmod's range. Karmod offers one model of each type.

How much do office pods cost? Sizes and prices

Karmod office pods cost from £4,450 + VAT for the Office Phone Booth to £14,950 + VAT for the XXL Meeting Pod. Sizes are external, given as width × length × height.

Prices are per pod and include LED lighting and a power socket / USB charging point. Furniture, delivery and offloading are quoted separately, and VAT is charged at the standard rate of 20%. Every pod comes with a one-year warranty.

Which office pod suits your team?

Choose by what people will do inside and how many will use the pod at once, counting the calls and meetings that overlap in your busiest hour rather than the office headcount.

For calls: the Office Phone Booth, 1.05 m × 1.05 m (3 ft 5 in square), is a one-person booth for private phone and video calls in an open-plan office. Photos of the actual booth on the Office Phone Booth page show a small built-in worktop on the side wall, a ceiling light and a power point, with a charcoal exterior and mustard-yellow padded interior panels.

For focused work: the Office Work Pod, 1.26 m × 1.60 m (4 ft 2 in × 5 ft 3 in), gives one person room for a small desk and chair, quoted separately, for longer stretches of work away from the open office.

For small meetings: the XL Meeting Pod, 1.26 m × 2.20 m (4 ft 2 in × 7 ft 3 in), takes one to four people for one-to-ones, interviews and online meetings. It has the same width and height as the Work Pod but is 0.60 m longer, for £1,800 + VAT more.

For team meetings: the XXL Meeting Pod, 2.50 m × 2.20 m (8 ft 2 in × 7 ft 3 in), takes up to seven people. Its footprint, 5.5 m², is almost twice the XL's 2.8 m².

The Work Pod, XL and XXL are shown in renders with a charcoal exterior, orange acoustic interior panels and a full-height glazed front with a glazed door. Beyond offices, pods suit co-working spaces, libraries, schools and universities, healthcare administration and showrooms.

How quiet is an office pod? NRC explained

Karmod's pods have a supplier-rated noise reduction coefficient (NRC) of 0.95, which measures how much sound the interior acoustic surfaces absorb rather than reflect, not how much sound passes through the walls to the office outside.

NRC runs from 0 to 1. At 0.95, the interior surfaces absorb most of the sound that reaches them, which cuts echo inside the pod. Whether colleagues outside can hear a conversation is a separate question, decided by the walls, glazing and door together.

What should you ask a supplier about acoustics?

Ask for the speech level reduction measured to ISO 23351-1, the international laboratory method for pods and other enclosures. The result is a single figure for how much a pod reduces the level of speech reaching the space around it. Higher is better.

Then ask whether an independent laboratory tested the same model and size you are buying, with the door closed, and ask to see the full test report rather than a brochure figure. Karmod does not publish a speech level reduction figure for these pods, so if you need speech privacy, for example for HR conversations or confidential calls, ask us whether any test data is available for your chosen model before you order.

How are office pods delivered, and will they fit through the door?

Karmod office pods are delivered fully assembled, in one piece, wrapped in bubble wrap and stretch film. Nothing is built on site, so the complete pod has to travel the whole route from the delivery vehicle to its final position.

A standard UK internal door leaf is about 0.76–0.84 m wide (2 ft 6 in–2 ft 9 in) and 1.98 m high (6 ft 6 in). Every Karmod pod is larger: the narrowest is 1.05 m wide and the lowest 2.20 m high. Most sites therefore need a loading door or another opening that is both wider and taller than the pod (double doors only if they are taller than the pod), with room in corridors and at every turn for the pod's length.

Before you order, measure the clear width and height of the entrance and of each door, corridor, corner, lift and staircase on the route, and the ceiling height where the pod will stand. Send us the measurements with photos of the route, and tell us the floor level and whether a lift or floor on the way has a load limit, as pod weights are not listed on our website. Delivery and offloading are quoted separately, to your postcode.

What does the price include, and what is extra?

Every Karmod pod includes LED lighting and a power socket / USB charging point. Furniture is not included: the tables, chairs and stools in our images are for illustration only and are quoted separately.

Plan where the pod will stand in relation to the building's power supply, and ask us how the pod connects so that your electrician or facilities team can prepare. Decide on furniture early as well: the Phone Booth has its own small worktop, while a meeting pod needs a table and seats that fit its floor.

Do you need permission for an office pod? Landlords and fire safety

A freestanding indoor pod is not a building extension, but it is a new enclosed space in your workplace, so plan for it before you order. In a rented office, check with the landlord or building manager first: they may have rules on what can stand on the floor, on deliveries through shared entrances and lifts, and on fire safety.

Add the pod to your workplace fire risk assessment. In England and Wales, the responsible person for a workplace must have one under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005; Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own fire safety law. Cover whether the fire alarm can be heard inside the pod with the door closed, whether escape routes and fire exits stay clear, and whether the pod's roof affects smoke detector or sprinkler coverage on that part of the floor. Do not assume a pod falls outside Building Regulations or fire rules; ask your building manager or fire risk assessor.

Should you choose an office pod or a garden office?

Karmod's office pods are for indoor use only. For a workspace in a garden or yard, choose a building made for outdoor use, such as our container garden offices or garden rooms and garden offices. Our garden buildings are taller than the 2.5 m eaves limit for permitted development in England, so planning permission is usually needed; our guide to portable cabins on private land explains the rules in England.

Should you choose an office pod or a partitioned meeting room?

A pod adds a private space without building work: it is a freestanding unit placed in the existing space, with its own lighting and power point, though it still needs power from the building. Building a meeting room from partitions is fit-out work, which usually needs a contractor and changes to lighting, heating and fire alarm coverage on that floor. Either way, in a rented office check with the landlord or building manager first, and add the new space to your fire risk assessment.

Partitions can make more sense for a room for more than seven people, the capacity of the largest Karmod pod.

Checklist before you order

• Use and headcount: calls, focused work or meetings, and how many people at once.
• Floor position: the pod's footprint plus room to open the door and step in, clear of escape routes.
• Ceiling height at that position, above the pod's 2.20 m or 2.24 m height, noting any light fittings, smoke detectors or sprinkler heads.
• The access route: clear width and height of every door, corridor, corner, lift and staircase from the delivery vehicle to the final position.
• Delivery access to the building: loading bay, goods lift and any set delivery times.
• Power: where the nearest supply is and who will connect the pod.
• Written approval from the landlord or building manager, if you rent.
• Your fire risk assessment, updated to include the pod.
• The acoustic test data you need from the supplier, if speech privacy matters.
• Furniture: what each pod needs and whether we should quote it.
• Budget: the pod price + VAT, plus delivery, offloading and any furniture.

How do you get a price for an office pod?

Send us the model and quantity, your postcode and floor level, and the access route measurements with photos, and we will prepare a formal quote including delivery and offloading. Call 0116 403 0143, message us on WhatsApp at +44 7359 538937, email info@karmodint.co.uk or request a quote online. Compare all four models in our office pods range.