From our enchanting medieval sets to our brutalist Cripps Building, St John’s guarantees accommodation for undergraduates throughout your time at Cambridge. Our rooms, food and facilities are among the best in the collegiate University and right in the heart of the city.
You can live at St John’s College from October until June, which is handy if you want to leave your belongings here during the vacations.
There are more than 500 rooms on our main College site, occupied by Fellows and undergraduate students. If you’re really lucky, you might find yourself living somewhere previously occupied by one of our notable alumni, such as William Wordsworth, Douglas Adams, Paul Dirac, and Heather Hancock.
Many first years, or freshers, live in the Cripps Building, Chapel Court or North Court so you can get to know each other easily. In Cripps, typically, you will have a single room, sharing a bathroom and kitchen with up to three other undergraduates. The North and Chapel Court rooms, known as sets, consist of two student bedrooms (with the smaller room priced at a lower rent), with a shared bathroom and small kitchen for up to four people.
After the first year, you can opt for a single room, share with your friends, or live with a group in one of the nearby shared College houses. All our rooms are furnished and include a high-speed internet connection, and access to a kitchen and free laundry facilities.
Our disabled students are part of a welcoming and supportive community who can help you achieve your full potential, including accommodation suited to your needs.
St John’s has four ground-floor student rooms adapted for wheelchair-users, as well as a number of other ground-floor rooms with step-free access suitable for ambulant disabled non-wheelchair users.
Most rooms on the College site are en-suite and further adaptations can be made if necessary. Live-in assistants and assistance dogs are possible. Your requirements should be discussed with the College well in advance.
You can find out more in our Disability Support section and FAQs.
Shared kitchen facilities are provided but if you don’t fancy cooking, there are plenty of other options. The College has an award-winning self-service canteen, called the Buttery, as well as a modern Café, which together provide meals, snacks, soup, salads and sandwiches at heavily subsidised prices and cater for most dietary needs.
Our students can also don their black gowns to eat candlelit formal dinner in Hall with friends and guests, which is a wonderful Cambridge tradition.
Rents at St John's are very competitive, vary according to the type of room and size, and fully cover your room from October until June – so you don’t have to move your possessions out for the Christmas and Easter vacations.
Prices include your energy costs, room contents insurance and free laundry facilities are available in the basement of the Cripps Building. Student rooms in College and in our shared houses are exempt from Council Tax.
On the main College site, your rent includes the fortnightly weekday cleaning of rooms (except for shared houses) and daily clean of communal areas by our Housekeeping staff, who are historically known as ‘bedders’.
Undergraduate rents for the 2025/2026 academic year range between £2,061 and £3,122 a term. St John's has adopted the Accreditation Network UK (ANUK) Code of Practice for the management of student housing.
Every student at St John’s is provided with a pigeonhole for external and internal mail and parcels can be collected from the Great Gate Porters’ Lodge.
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