What Is The Least Expensive Type Of Roof

Search this question and most of what comes back is written for somebody else's country.

Asphalt shingles top nearly every list. Three tab versus architectural.

Rolled roofing for the shed. Wood shakes for character. Lay the new shingles straight over the old ones to save on removal.

Almost none of that survives contact with Australian building rules.

Asphalt shingles are excluded from every bushfire rated site in the country. Rolled roofing is not a product category Australians buy. Wood shakes are out on the same bushfire grounds. And laying a second layer over the first is not Australian practice at all.

So this guide answers the question as it applies here, where the real constraint on a cheap roof is usually not your budget. It is your pitch, your bushfire rating and your distance from the sea.

What Rules Materials Out Before Price Does

Four things can eliminate a material entirely, and none of them appears on a quote.

Bushfire

This is the big one, and it is stricter than most summaries admit.

Under AS 3959, roof tiles, roof sheets and roof covering accessories must be non-combustible from BAL-12.5 upward. Not from BAL-29, which several widely circulated charts claim. From the lowest rated level.

The National Construction Code lists which materials are deemed non-combustible without testing: concrete, steel including metallic coated steel, masonry, aluminium, iron, terracotta, porcelain, ceramic, natural stone, copper, zinc, lead, bronze and brass. Bitumen is not on that list. Neither is timber. CSIRO puts the general position plainly, that roof cladding is required to be non-combustible in Australia.

So if your land is bushfire prone at any level, asphalt shingles and timber shingles are off the table before you look at a single price. That covers a great deal of Australia.

Pitch

Your existing roof pitch decides what you can put on it, and it is the constraint cost guides consistently ignore.

The National Construction Code requires metal sheet roofing to meet the minimum pitch for its profile, and manufacturers publish those minimums.

Read that from the bottom up and the point becomes obvious. Below about 15 degrees, tiles are gone and you are choosing between metal profiles. Below 5 degrees, even corrugated is out and you need trapezoidal or concealed fix.

And note where asphalt shingles sit. They need a higher pitch than most metal profiles, not a lower one. On the low pitch roof where a cheap covering matters most, the supposedly cheap option is not an option.

Tiled roofs under 18 degrees must be sarked, and under 20 degrees need anti-ponding devices, which adds cost the headline rate never mentions.

Salt Air

If you are near the coast, this is where the cheap steel roof stops being cheap.

BlueScope publishes minimum distances for its products. Standard Colorbond in Classic and Matt finishes is specified for use more than 200 metres from breaking surf. Colorbond Ultra, with a heavier coating, more than 100 metres. Stainless goes to the water's edge. Plain galvanised steel roofing is not recommended in marine environments at all.

Within a couple of hundred metres of surf, the budget sheet is outside the manufacturer's own recommendation and you are stepping up to a dearer grade. Which is one of the few situations where tile genuinely beats steel on cost, because concrete and terracotta do not care about salt.

Wind

Wind classification under AS 4055 runs N1 to N6 in non-cyclonic areas and C1 to C4 in cyclonic ones, set by region, terrain and shielding.

Tiles laid to the standard acceptable construction practice are limited to N3 or below. Above that, tile is not simply more expensive, it needs specific engineering. That is a material restriction driven by where you live, not by what you can afford.

So What Is Actually Cheapest In Australia

Nobody publishes comparable per square metre rates for Australian roof cladding by material. The authoritative construction cost reference keeps its roofing rates behind a subscription. And the ABS does not collect roof cladding material in its building approvals data at all, which is why every "X per cent of Australian homes have a metal roof" claim you read online has no source behind it. We looked for one.

What we can tell you, from the constraints above rather than from prices, is which material is most widely usable at low cost, and that is corrugated steel.

It is non-combustible, so it is available at every bushfire attack level. It works from 5 degrees, where tile needs 15 to 20. It is light enough that it rarely forces a structural upgrade, unlike tile. It is manufactured here with published technical support rather than imported to foreign instructions. If you are pricing a coated steel roof specifically, our Colorbond re-roofing cost guide

goes through what sits inside those quotes. And it is the default on Australian sheds, farms and houses for all of those reasons together.

That is a different claim from "cheapest per square metre", and it is the one we can actually stand behind.

The Other Realistic Options

Concrete tile is the budget end of the tile category and a fixture across Australian suburbs. It costs more upfront than sheet steel and it is heavy, so the roof structure has to carry it. Individual tiles are cheap to replace, which matters over decades. And it is unaffected by salt air.

Terracotta tile sits above concrete on price. The practical difference is not durability, it is colour: terracotta's colour is fired through the body, while concrete's is a surface coating. It also reaches a lower pitch than most concrete profiles, down to about 12 degrees in some ranges.

Standing seam and concealed fix metal cost more than corrugated because of the extra material and labour in the seams. They buy you the lowest pitch capability of anything on the list, down to 1 degree, and a cleaner look. Not the cheap option, but sometimes the only one that works on a low pitch roof.

Slate, copper and timber are character materials, not budget ones. They belong in a conversation about heritage and longevity, not about saving money.

What The Number On Your Quote Actually Covers

The reason material comparisons mislead is that the covering is a minority of the job. Everything else on a re-roof happens regardless of which material you pick, and it is where quotes diverge.

A roof replacement quote is really eight separate pieces of work bundled into one figure.

The strip-out. Removing the existing covering, battens where they are being replaced, and any fixings. Tile is heavy and slow to strip. Sheet steel comes off faster. This is labour, and it scales with the old roof, not the new one.

Disposal. Skip or tip fees for the material coming off. Concrete tile is dense and heavy, so a tile strip-out generates far more tonnage than a steel one. If there is asbestos cement in the mix, this line changes character entirely, which we cover below.

Battens and structure. Tile battens and sheet battens are not the same spacing or the same section. Changing material usually means new battens. If the roof frame needs work, it surfaces here, and it is the single most common reason a quote comes back higher than the phone estimate.

Sarking and insulation. The National Construction Code sets sarking requirements for tiled roofs by pitch band. Tiled roofs under 18 degrees need sarking and under 20 degrees need anti-ponding devices. On a low pitch tile roof this is not optional and it is not free.

The covering itself. The part every online comparison talks about, and usually the smallest labour component of the eight.

Fixings and flashings. Under the Code, metal sheet roofing must be crest fastened or concealed fixed at specified spacings, with fixings in a metal compatible with the roof. Fixing pattern varies by profile, and trapezoidal and concealed fastener profiles are fixed at every rib rather than every second or third. Flashings at valleys, ridges, penetrations and roof to wall junctions are fabricated on site. A quote that does not mention flashings is not a complete quote.

Rainwater goods. Gutters and downpipes are usually replaced with the roof, and the Code has more to say about them than most people expect. Gutter sizing depends on rainfall intensity and the catchment area feeding each downpipe, a maximum of 12 metres of gutter may be served by one downpipe, and overflow measures must be provided for rainfall events well beyond the design event, discharging where they will not pond against or enter the building. Undersized gutters are a common defect on a cheap re-roof and they show up as overflow into the eaves in the first heavy storm, and they also make gutter cleaning

a more frequent job than it should be.

Access and safety. Scaffold, edge protection or an elevated work platform. This is set by the building and the site, not by the covering. A two storey roof with no ground clearance costs more to access than a single storey roof on a flat block, whatever you put on it.

When you are comparing quotes, the material line is often the only one you are actually comparing. Ask for the other seven to be separated out and the cheap quote frequently stops being the cheap quote.

Who Is Allowed To Install It, And Whether You Are Covered

This is the part of a cheap roof that people discover afterwards.

Roofing is not licensed the same way in any two Australian states, and the differences are large enough to change who you can legally hire.

Two things in that table matter more than the rest.

The first is Western Australia, where there is no roofing licence at all. Building and Energy publishes scopes of work for builders, building surveyors, painters, plumbers and gasfitters, and roofing is not among them. The WA plumbers' scope covers water supply, sanitary fixtures and underground wastewater pipes, and roof drainage does not appear in it. So in Perth, checking a licence number does not tell you what it tells you in Melbourne.

The second is the insurance spread. A typical re-roof at around $18,000 is covered by statutory insurance in Queensland and Victoria and completely uninsured in New South Wales, Western Australia and South Australia. Queensland's threshold of $3,300 catches essentially every roof job in the state. The others do not. Victoria is a further wrinkle, because a metal re-roof contracted through a licensed plumber runs on compulsory plumber insurance and plumbing compliance certificates rather than domestic building insurance, so do not assume the builder's scheme applies.

The practical version is short. Ask who is doing the work and under what licence, ask whether the job value crosses your state's insurance threshold, and if it sits just under, understand that you are carrying the risk yourself. You can check a tradie's licence in your state

before you sign anything.

The Roof You Already Have Can Decide The Price

On a house built before the late 1980s, the cheapest new covering is often irrelevant, because the expensive part is what comes off.

Asbestos cement roof sheeting was widely used in Australian housing. The practical identifiers, per WA Health guidance, are the brand name Super Six, roughly seven ridges across a one metre wide sheet, and diamond shaped metal fasteners.

If that is what you have, three things follow.

Removal without a licence is only permitted for 10 square metres or less of non-friable asbestos. No house roof is 10 square metres, so a whole roof replacement always requires a licensed removalist, at minimum a Class B licence for non-friable material. That is a separate trade and a separate cost line before your roofer starts.

High pressure water cleaning of asbestos cement is prohibited. WorkSafe Queensland states there is no system of use that can effectively capture or suppress asbestos fibres in those circumstances, and SafeWork NSW lists high pressure water spray and compressed air as prohibited equipment for asbestos work. WorkSafe Queensland issued a fresh incident alert in January 2026 after a contractor pressure sprayed an asbestos roof and spread contaminated debris across neighbouring properties and a public road. If a quote includes pressure washing the old roof, that quote is describing an offence.

Painting is a different matter. WA Health treats painting as a permitted surface treatment where preparation is done by gentle wet methods. So the sequence that gets people into trouble is not painting, it is pressure washing to prepare for painting.

None of this makes the new covering more expensive. It makes the job more expensive, which is the number you actually pay. If you suspect asbestos, get it identified before you collect roofing quotes, and use an asbestos removal specialist

for that part of the work.

What The Lifespan Numbers Are Worth

You will see confident ranges everywhere. Metal 30 to 75 years. Slate 75 to 150. Clay over 100. Concrete at least 50. Shingles 12 to 30.

We went looking for where those come from, and the answer is mostly nowhere. They are conventional trade press bands that circulate by repetition. No Australian standard, regulator or manufacturer publishes them.

What is actually published is narrower and more useful.

BlueScope publishes no service life figure for Colorbond steel roofing at all. Its sample warranty is a template with the period left blank, because terms depend on the product, the application and the site, and are issued case by case. So any number you are quoted for a Colorbond roof's life is somebody's estimate.

Australia's largest tile maker now warrants its tiles for 30 years, not 50. Monier's warranty dropped to 30 years for tiles purchased from 1 July 2026. The superseded 50 year documents are still online, which is exactly how the old figure keeps propagating. If you are reading a guide published before this year, that number is out of date.

The one traceable figure is slate's, guaranteed for 100 years by a British quarry with a much longer expected life. Which tells you something about the material and nothing about the Australian market.

The honest way to use lifespan in a buying decision is to treat it as a rough ordering rather than a calculation. Tile and slate outlast sheet steel. Steel outlasts anything bitumen based. Beyond that, installation quality, coastal exposure and maintenance move the number more than the material does.

Why The Cheapest Roof Is Rarely The Cheapest Roof

The standard advice here is to divide price by lifespan and pick the winner. That is fine as far as it goes, but it assumes you know the lifespan, and we have just established that mostly you do not.

A better way to think about it is what each choice locks in.

A cheap covering on the wrong pitch leaks, and the leak is not a covering problem, it is a design problem you cannot patch your way out of. A cheap steel grade near the surf corrodes on a schedule the manufacturer will tell you about in advance if you ask. A combustible covering on bushfire prone land is not a value question at all, it is a compliance failure.

And the cost that catches people hardest is not the roof. It is what the roof does to the structure underneath it, which brings us to the decision most people get wrong.

Changing Material Is A Structural Decision

If you are replacing tile with steel because steel is cheaper, stop and read this part.

Western Australia's building regulator is explicit that when replacing a roof covering with a material of a different weight or shape, a building permit will likely be required. Going heavier may need additional or larger structural support. Going lighter may need upgraded tie-downs to prevent the roof from blowing away.

That second one is counterintuitive and it is the one that bites. A tile roof uses its own weight to help resist wind uplift. Take the weight off and the tie-downs have to carry loads the mass used to offset.

The same regulator investigated storm damage and found that replacement roofs, often in a different material to the original, were over-represented. Among storm damaged Perth metropolitan properties, about half involved lightweight metal sheet cladding that had replaced original heavy tile or asbestos cladding. And those modified roofs were damaged even when winds did not exceed the speeds building standards require them to withstand. Missing permits and inadequate tie-downs were recurring causes, with structural checking by an engineer or registered builder not done in many cases.

So a tile to metal conversion is not a cheaper covering. It is a structural change that needs a permit and an engineering assessment, and the saving evaporates if those are done properly. Which they should be.

Why Roof Work Is The Wrong Place To Chase The Lowest Quote

There is one more reason the cheapest roof quote is often the wrong one, and it has nothing to do with the material.

The duty to manage fall risk under work health and safety law has no minimum height. The commonly repeated two metre rule is about paperwork, not about when safety applies: falls of more than two metres make the job high risk construction work, which triggers a safe work method statement. Below that, the duty to control the risk still applies.

Safe Work Australia's dedicated analysis of roof falls, covering 2003 to 2011, recorded 25 worker deaths from falls from roofs, with roof repair, removal of old roof sheeting and painting the three activities involved. Half of those deaths involved falls of three metres or less, mostly from residential properties. Single storey does not mean low risk.

The current picture is not reassuring either. In SafeWork NSW's falls from heights campaign across August to October 2025, inspectors made 935 workplace visits, issued 1,058 compliance notices and $223,950 in on the spot fines. On roof work specifically, only 60 per cent of sites had higher order controls such as scaffold, roof guard rails or elevated work platforms in place. Two in five roof jobs inspected did not.

A quote that is well below the others has usually saved the money somewhere. Access and edge protection are the easiest place to save it, and they are the line item you would least want removed.

What This Means For Your Quote

Get the constraints out of the way before you get prices, because they narrow the field for you.

Find out your bushfire attack level, if any. Measure or ask about your roof pitch. Check your distance from breaking surf if you are coastal. Those three answers will usually leave you with two or three viable materials rather than eight.

Then get three quotes on the same material and the same scope, and make sure each one separates the covering from the strip-out, the disposal, the battens, the sarking, the rainwater goods, the access and any structural work. A rate per square metre means nothing until you know which of those it includes. Our guide to what roof work should cost

covers how to read those quotes line by line.

And do not skip the installer to save money on the material. Australian metal roofing is roof plumbing work, licensed in several states, and a budget covering fitted badly fails early enough to erase the entire saving.

Frequently Asked Questions

These are the questions that come up most often when people start pricing a roof replacement.

What Is The Cheapest Roofing Material In Australia?

Corrugated steel is the most widely usable low cost option, because it is non-combustible and available at every bushfire attack level, works from 5 degrees of pitch, and is light enough to rarely force structural upgrades. We cannot tell you it is cheapest per square metre, because no independent Australian source publishes comparable rates by material and the authoritative reference is paywalled.

Are Asphalt Shingles Cheap In Australia?

They are a niche import here, not a mainstream option. No Australian Standard covers their installation, so they are fitted to North American manufacturer instructions. More importantly, AS 3959 requires roof coverings to be non-combustible from BAL-12.5 upward, which excludes them from every bushfire rated site. They also need a higher minimum pitch than most metal profiles.

What Is The Minimum Roof Pitch For Each Material?

Concealed fix metal profiles go to 1 degree, trapezoidal profiles to between 1.5 and 3 degrees, and corrugated to 5 degrees. Terracotta tile in its lowest profiles reaches about 12 degrees, and most concrete tile needs 15 degrees, or 20 unsarked. Tiled roofs under 18 degrees require sarking and under 20 degrees require anti-ponding devices.

How Long Does A Cheap Roof Last?

Less confidently than the internet suggests. BlueScope publishes no service life figure for Colorbond, and its warranties are issued per project depending on product, application and site. Monier reduced its tile warranty from 50 to 30 years for tiles purchased from 1 July 2026, so older guides quoting 50 years are out of date. Treat published lifespan ranges as rough ordering rather than data.

Is Metal Cheaper Than Tile?

Usually per square metre of covering, but not always in total. Tile does not require the tie-down upgrade and engineering assessment that switching from tile to metal can trigger, and tile is unaffected by salt air where steel near breaking surf needs a dearer grade. On a low pitch roof tile is not an option at any price.

Do You Need A Permit To Change Roof Material?

Likely yes. Western Australia's regulator states that replacing a roof covering with a material of a different weight or shape will likely require a building permit, and that changing to a lighter covering may involve upgraded tie-downs. Check with your local authority before committing, because starting without a required permit is an offence.

Do You Need A Licensed Roofer In Every State?

Not in the same way. In Victoria, work on metal roofs may only be done by registered or licensed plumbers. New South Wales requires a roof plumbing licence, and Queensland a QBCC roof and wall cladding or plumbing licence. South Australia captures roofing under the building work contractor licence, including subcontractors. Western Australia has no roofing or roof plumbing licence at all, so a licence check there does not tell you what it tells you elsewhere.

What If Your Old Roof Contains Asbestos?

Then the strip-out becomes a licensed job before the new covering matters. Removal without a licence is only permitted for 10 square metres or less of non-friable asbestos, and no house roof is that small, so a licensed removalist is required. High pressure water cleaning of asbestos cement is prohibited by state regulators, so treat any quote offering to pressure wash the old roof as a warning sign rather than a saving.

Compare Roofing Contractors With Trade Heroes

The short version is that the cheapest roof in Australia is whichever compliant material suits your pitch, your bushfire rating and your distance from the sea, and that for most homes that turns out to be corrugated steel by default rather than by calculation.

Work out your constraints first, then get quotes on the same scope, and treat any guide that opens with asphalt shingles as one that has not been written for this country.

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