Norwich Bin Collection Days: Bank Holidays Add a Day

Norwich City Council will tell you your next collection date once you have typed in an address. What it will not tell you on that screen is that the whole city is running a day late this week, that glass goes in the blue bin here, or that you have exactly two working days to report a bin the crew left behind.

Every figure on this page was checked on 2 September 2026 against Norwich City Council’s own pages and Norfolk County Council’s recycling centre listings.

This week: collections are one day later

Norwich moved every round on by a day for the August bank holiday week, starting Monday 31 August. The council’s bank holiday notice sets it out:

Collections return to normal on Monday 7 September.

We checked this against a real address. The council’s bin day lookup shows 72 Unthank Road, normally a Thursday round, listed for food waste and recycling on Friday 4 September, then back to Thursday from 10 September. The shift is real, and the Friday rounds genuinely do get a Saturday collection.

That is the pattern to remember: a bank holiday Monday pushes every day of that week on by one, and the last round of the week lands on the Saturday.

Which bin is which

Norwich runs four containers, and which ones you have depends on whether your property takes wheelie bins or sacks. From the council’s when to put out your bins page:

• blue bin or blue sack: mixed recycling, every other week
• black bin or black sack: general rubbish, every other week for bins, weekly for sacks
• food caddy: every week
• brown bin: garden waste, every other week, paid subscription

Flats on communal bins get recycling and general rubbish fortnightly and food waste weekly.

Small electrical items, batteries and textiles are collected weekly from the kerbside. Leave them in a separate bag next to your bin. The council asks that you do not put toasters, kettles, phones or batteries in the black bin at all.

The blue bin takes glass

This is the one that catches people who have moved from another district. Norwich’s blue bin list includes bottles and jars, lids left on, and the council specifically asks you to put glass inside the bin rather than beside it. Also on the list, and often missed:

• aerosol cans, as long as they are empty and not paint aerosols
• toothpaste tubes
• pizza boxes, if there is no food residue left inside
• shredded paper, loose rather than bagged
• drink, milk and bathroom bottles with the lids left on

Wrapping paper only counts if it is clean and free of tape, ribbon and glitter.

The food caddy takes all food waste including meat, bones, fish and pet food, but nothing packaged and no garden waste. If you run out of liners, tie a bag to your outside bin and the crew may leave a new roll.

Put it out after 6pm, and no later than 6am

Bins go out close to but outside your property boundary, no earlier than 6pm the night before and no later than 6am on the day. They must be back inside your boundary by 9am the next morning. The council will not empty a bin whose lid will not close, one that is overflowing, or one with the wrong items in it.

Garden waste costs £65

The brown bin is a paid annual subscription. From the council’s sign-up terms:

The charge covers up to 25 collections a year and includes delivery of the bin. It is non-refundable, though it can be transferred to another person or to another address inside the city. There are no garden waste collections over the Christmas and New Year period, which is why the year runs to 25 rather than 26 fortnightly rounds.

If you swap a 180 litre bin for a 240 litre one, you may get a used bin rather than a new one. Replacements for damaged bins can be used bins too.

Ash leaves and branches should not go in the brown bin, because of ash dieback. The council asks you to leave them where they are instead.

Bulky collections start at £24.50

Prices step up in blocks rather than per item, from the council’s bulky item page:

The jump between three items and four is £20, and the jump between six and seven is another £20.50. If you are near one of those thresholds it is worth checking whether the extra item is worth the step.

Items must be out by 6.30am at your front boundary, or on the ground floor outside the building if you live in a flat. There is no refund if you cancel or if the items are not there when the crew arrives. The service is for households only.

The council will take furniture, fridges, washing machines, mattresses, bikes, TVs, carpets and children’s play equipment. It will not take bagged rubbish, builders’ rubble, plasterboard, doors, windows, radiators, boilers, kitchen cupboards, gas bottles, paint cans, tyres or garden waste.

Missed collection: two working days

You have two working days from your scheduled collection day to report a missed bin, and the council says it cannot accept reports after that. Report it through the missed collection form.

The exception matters: food waste, textiles, electricals and batteries are not eligible for a missed collection report at all. Leave those out the following week instead.

Before you report, check the bin was out on time and in the right place, and that the right items were in it. The crew can legitimately skip a bin that was late out, overfilled, too heavy, contaminated, or blocked in by parked cars.

Recycling centres: two sites, both shut on Wednesdays

Norfolk County Council runs the tips, not the city council. The two nearest are:

You have to book, and a slot is free. Bookings open up to a week ahead, and you need the registration of the vehicle you are bringing. Pedestrians arriving on foot with small amounts of waste from home still need to book, using the pedestrian option on the form.

Both sites are open on bank holidays, except Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day. Trade waste is a narrower window: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday only, and not on bank holidays.

Norwich North and Norwich South are two of only seven sites in Norfolk still taking fridges and freezers, alongside Caister, Dereham, Hempton, King’s Lynn and Thetford. Norfolk County Council says that is down to a national shortage of processing sites.

Directions for Norwich South come with a warning from the council itself: it is off the A140/A47 roundabout, is not accessible from the B1113 entrance, and you should not rely on satnav. At Norwich North, do not park on Morse Road or in the junctions, because of construction traffic.

Both sites have a reuse shop, which needs no booking. They also sell compost at £4.75 for roughly 40 litres, 220 litre compost bins at £15 with a second at half price, gritting salt at £7 for 26kg, and garden waste sacks at £4 each.

What this page does not cover

Norwich publishes a separate dated notice for each bank holiday and takes it down afterwards, so the Christmas and New Year timetable is not out yet. We will add it when the council publishes it. The only firm Christmas fact today is that garden waste stops over that period.

More Norwich local information: parking in Norwich, council tax bands and roadworks and travel.