A guide to serviced offices and office space to rent in Watford, as well as general information that may be useful if you are thinking of renting office space in the Hertfordshire town.
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History & Geography
Approximately 20 miles northwest of central London, Watford is a thriving town and borough of Hertfordshire with its own unique identity and feel, despite the proximity of its larger neighbour. Watford is located on a small hill near a ford of the River Colne and was first inhabited as a rest stop for those travelling between London and the Midlands. The route heads up the Gade Valley, and up the Bulbourne Valley to a low section of the Chiltern Hills, almost the exact route Watford’s High Street follows today. Due to its location, Watford became an important trading post and in 1100, Henry I granted permission for the town to hold a market. In 1230, Watford’s parish church of St Mary the Virgin was built, and in the 17th century, the Earls of Essex and Clarendon each built grand houses in the area. For many centuries, Watford was a mainly agricultural town with some trade being undertaken. However, in 1798 the Grand Junction Canal was built and, in 1837, the London and Birmingham Railway was constructed. Both chose to go through Watford to take advantage of the easy gradient over the nearby Chiltern Hills, and both brought a major change to the town. The canal and railway provided Watford with efficient communication links and spurred unprecedented industrial growth. Coal was brought into the area, and a gas works was built. Papermaking and brewing also became important industries in Watford. In 1925, the Metropolitan underground line was extended to Watford, and the town continued to prosper. However, in the 1950s, Watford’s brewing industry declined along with the printing industry. Gradually, Watford changed from being an industrial centre to a service-based economy. Today, Watford is known for being a commuter town feeding London, as well as a regional centre of retail and entertainment.
Economy
Watford’s rail links have made the area popular with businesses. The main bulwark of Watford’s economy is retail. The borough attracts many visitors with its Harlequin Shopping Centre, a huge indoor mall with more than 140 shops, restaurants and cafes. Opened in 1992, the centre provides hundreds of jobs to the area and is visited by over 17 million customers every year. Watford is also home to the headquarters of several large British companies, including JD Wetherspoon, the operators of the National Lottery Camelot Group, Haden Young, and construction companies Balfour Beatty and Taylor Woodrow. There is also a growing media and creative industries presence in Watford, with Leavesden Studios based in the city, as well as over 300 other media and creative companies. Also among the more recent industries in Watford is the environmental technology industry. The world-renowned green technology firms BRE and RES chose to base themselves in Watford. Many high-profile occupiers also have a presence in the area, including Asos, Skanska, Total Oil, Sanyo, TK Maxx, Costco and Beko. The area is also well known for the Grove Hotel, at which several international golf tournaments have been held.
In 2012, The Making of Harry Potter tour opened at the Warner Bros. Studios in Leavesden to the public and attracted up to 6,000 visitors a day during peak times,
Culture & Sites
One of Watford’s most famous landmarks is Cassiobury Park, which was formed out of the grounds of the historic Cassiobury House, which was demolished in 1927. In 2007, the park won a Green Flag Award, being recognised as one of the most beautiful green spaces in the UK. Another important landmark in Watford is the Watford Colosseum, a music hall which hosted some of the world’s most famous acts, including Oasis, Robbie Williams, and The Who. The hall is regularly used by the BBC Concert Orchestra to record concerts. Also culturally important to Watford is the Pumphouse Theatre and Arts Centre, a venue based in an old pumping station on the lower end of Watford’s High Street. It contains a 124-seat theatre and a live music venue as well as rehearsal rooms and meeting areas. Also, well-known in the area is the Watford Palace Theatre, the only producing theatre in the county of Hertfordshire. The local football ground is Vicarage Road, from which Watford FC play.
Transportation
Watford is served by the West Coast Mainline connecting London to the Midlands and North West England. Some of the trains on this line also serve Watford Junction, located close to the town centre. Watford is also served by the London Underground’s Metropolitan line, with the station being located near Cassiobury Park. In Watford itself, the most popular form of public transport is the bus system, which is run by a number of companies including Arriva, Uno, Red Rose Travel and Carousel. Due to its flatness, cycling is fairly popular in Watford, and the town has a number of good cycle routes.
Office space to rent in Watford
In 2013, the prime rent in Watford was approximately £20 per square foot per year, a figure that was expected to remain about the same for the next year or so.
Take-up had dropped fairly significantly in the last year ut agents saw signs that it was beginning to pick up again.
The M25 north area was seeing more speculative development as demand started to rise; however, little of this was in the immediate area in and around Watford itself. In 2013, the area had a vacancy rate of approximately 5 per cent.
In 2021, office space take-up in Watford was approximately 116,000 square feet, boosted by sizeable acquisitions by Enterprise Finance and PWC. The take-up figure represented a 114 per cent improvement on 2020’s total.
In 2022, 70 per cent of the office transactions were Grade A space, indicating a ‘flight to quality’ by occupiers. Landlords and developers are responding by delivering premium space that offers ESG credentials.
Landlords at Croxley Park have achieved £35.00 per square foot, and rents were expected to reach £37.50 in 2023 at the 37-39 Clarendon Road mixed-use scheme delivered by the same developers that built TKMaxx’s new £93m European headquarters office.
Known as The Clarendon Works, the 173,000-square-foot scheme is Watford’s largest speculative development.
Also targeting BREEAM Excellent certification, the scheme achieved ActiveScore Platinum and WiredScore Platinum and is also targeting a WELL Platinum rating.
The scheme features car parking spaces with EV chargers, an on-site gym with classes, changing facilities, external green spaces, an on-site cafe, secure bike parking with repair facilities, and a spa treatment room, amongst many other amenities and facilities.
In March 2024, it was announced that Epson had signed for 30,530 square feet at the best-in-class sustainable office development.
Epson’s deal at The Clarendon Works was a pre-let with the scheme set to be completed in Q3 2024.
This followed another pre-let deal to flexible office provider YoooServ, which leased 16,795 square feet on the ground and first floors for 12 years. The provider would offer fully customisable flexible workspaces with private offices, tech-led meeting rooms, breakout spaces, and video call booths, in addition to an event space with in-house catering.
Other tenants who have agreed to rent space at The Clarendon Works are two sister companies of YoooServ—Bla Bla will operate a cafe on the ground floor, and Bombino will operate the 11th-floor bar and roof terrace.
The Clarendon Works completed in June 2024 and achieved BREEAM ‘Excellent’ certification.
In June 2025, it was reported that Racal Acoustics had agreed to rent 22,277 square feet at Croxley Park and would occupy the entire Building 1 at the scheme.
The company develops and manufactures advanced hearing protection and headsets used in defence, rescue services, and aviation, and had been based in the capital for several decades before the move.
In October 2025, retirement, insurance, and wealth management provider Canada Life signed a lease for the entire fifth floor at The Clarendon Works scheme, totalling 15,265 square feet of Grade A office space.
When analysing market data, Watford is classed as a submarket within the Greater London and Southeast office market.
Analysis of the wider market in 2026 by commercial property consultancy Savills found that supply levels were at their lowest ever recorded, as take-up in 2025 reached 2.5 million square feet.
The total supply of 11. 8 million square feet at the end of 2025 represented an 11 per cent decline compared with the end of 2024.
In 2025, 11 submarkets within the wider market achieved record rents, resulting in an average prime office rent of £64.50 per square foot for the region.
Grade A and prime office space across the region totalled 5.2 million square feet and 1.7 million square feet, respectively, and with minimal speculative developments ongoing, further rental growth was expected.
In Q1 2026, there were no speculative developments ongoing in Watford and following 2025, in which headline rents increased by 2 per cent to £45.00 per square foot per annum, it was anticipated that refurbishment projects creating Grade A space would help satisfy demand for high quality space.
12 flex space providers in Watford offer alternatives to traditionally rented office space. They offer fully serviced offices on short-term contracts, managed office suites with all-inclusive pricing, corporate coworking desk space membership plans and other forms of flexible workspace.
Profiles of all of these providers can be seen in this directory.
We carry out a free office space search, and our advisory and acquisition services are also free, always. Our Watford office space brokers and agents are globally regulated by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) ensuring the highest standards of commercial property advice and service at all times. We look forward to helping you find the best office space for rent for your business.
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