Yes, bunk beds can be used in hotels, hostels and family rooms, and there’s no national regulation banning them. They do, however, need to meet EN 747, which for professional use requires stricter load and durability testing, guard rails at least 16 centimetres above the mattress, and an explicit warning against using the top bunk under the age of six. The critical point isn’t product compliance, which reputable manufacturers guarantee, it’s the room height: below 250 centimetres of ceiling a two-tier bunk becomes uncomfortable, and below 230 there’s no point installing one.
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The measurements that decide everything
Before browsing catalogues, it pays to measure the room and check it against these figures. These are design values commonly used in the contract sector, not legal requirements, and they need reading alongside the regional accommodation regulation.
| Measurement | Reference value | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Ceiling height | minimum 250 cm, ideally 270+ | below 250, whoever sleeps on top can’t sit up |
| Clear space between the top mattress and the ceiling | at least 75 cm, better 90 | this is the figure that makes the top bunk sellable |
| Clear height of the bottom bunk | 95 / 110 cm from the mattress to the structure above | below 90, you hit your head sitting up |
| Guard rail on the top bunk | at least 16 cm above the mattress | EN 747 requirement, voided if the mattress is too thick |
| Maximum thickness of the top mattress | 14 / 18 cm depending on the model | stated by the manufacturer, needs respecting |
| External footprint of a 90×200 bunk bed | around 100 x 208 cm | the frame adds 4 or 5 cm per side |
| Passage between two adjacent bunk beds | minimum 75 cm, better 90 | needed to make the beds and for suitcases |
| Angled ladder, floor space | 45 / 70 cm in projection | takes up usable floor area, needs marking on the plan |
The figure that always turns up as a problem on site is the first one. Many rooms in refurbished buildings have a false ceiling at 240 or 245 centimetres for services reasons, and in that case the top bunk sits at 155 centimetres with barely 80 centimetres of air above the mattress. You can sleep there, but you can’t sit up without stooping. If the room is meant for long stays, that figure needs defending at the design stage against anyone proposing to lower the false ceiling to run a duct through.
What the standard actually requires
EN 747 is split into two parts: the first sets the safety, strength and durability requirements for bunk beds and high beds, the second describes the test methods. The most recent version has tightened some of the tests. A bed for a hostel needs buying with a declaration of conformity that cites professional use, the one that covers deployment in a hospitality property and that makes the difference in the event of an injury.
The guard rails
The top bunk needs guard rails on all four sides, with only the openings needed for access. The top edge of the rail needs to sit at least 16 centimetres above the mattress surface, and this is where the single most common mistake happens: a compliant bunk bed gets bought and then paired with a 22 or 25-centimetre mattress, bought for extra comfort, which cuts the clearance to nine or ten centimetres and makes the bed non-compliant. Compliance lies in the combination, not the frame alone. Every manufacturer states the maximum mattress thickness on the label or at the end of the rail, and that number needs following to the letter, including replacements made three years later by a purchasing manager who knows nothing about that label.
The standard also governs openings: no gap should be able to trap a head or a limb, tubes can’t have open ends, and edges and corners need rounding or chamfering. The access opening to the ladder has a maximum permitted width, beyond which the gap becomes a fall risk.
The ladder
Vertical rung ladders cost less and take up very little space, but in a hospitality property they’re the worst choice. Guests use them at night, in the dark, often barefoot, and round rungs under the sole of the foot are painful and slippery. An angled ladder between 60 and 70 degrees, with flat treads at least 8 centimetres wide and a non-slip surface, cuts falls significantly, in exchange for half a square metre of floor. It needs fixing to the frame, not just resting against it, because a removable ladder in a dorm room ends up moved around or used as a coat hook.
The top handrail, or at least a grab point at rail height, is the detail that separates a properly designed ladder from an added-on one.
Age
Compliant bunk beds carry a warning that the top bunk isn’t suitable for children under six. That’s not advice, it’s a regulated requirement, and in a hospitality property it becomes an operational problem: a guest arrives with a four-year-old and asks for the top bunk. The property needs to know how to say no and offer an alternative, which is why it’s useful to design family rooms with an additional floor-level bed rather than relying on the bunk bed alone. The same care applies to spaces designed for young children, where designing a safe children’s area follows an identical logic: measurements, guards, materials that don’t chip.
Load capacity and safety of bunk beds for hotels
Contract bunk beds typically state 120 to 150 kilograms per bunk, with metal hostel-grade models reaching 200. The figure to ask the supplier for is the load capacity per single bunk for professional use, noting whether it refers to static or dynamic load, because these are different things, and it’s the dynamic figure that matters when two people sit on the edge.
What holds a contract bunk bed together is the joints. In a dorm room the bed gets loaded and unloaded every day, stressed laterally by people climbing up and moved for cleaning, and welded metal joints or plate fittings on tubular uprights take that stress without gaining play. It’s the main reason you see almost nothing but powder-coated metal in hostels.
Anyone running dorm rooms needs to schedule bolt tightening twice a year. It’s a twenty-minute job per bed, and nobody does it until the first guest writes in a review that the bed wobbled.
Two more features are worth requesting from the supplier, which by 2026 are the standard expected by anyone booking a hostel: a socket with USB on every bunk, and a curtain or panel for privacy at each berth. Together with a phone shelf and a hook, these add sixty to eighty euros per bed and show up directly in guest ratings. Anyone designing dorm rooms and shared spaces for a hostel should start here, even before the bed itself.
Fire behaviour
The metal frame poses no issues, while mattresses need approving to class 1 IM, the same as in any other room. In wooden bunk beds or ones with upholstered side panelling, the covering’s classification also comes into play, and the requirement changes depending on the property’s category and floor area. The documentation needs keeping in the file alongside the rest of the fire safety regulations applied to furnishings, because during an inspection it gets requested by batch, not by model.
When it makes sense, and when it’s better avoided
Bunk beds work well in hostels, where the bed space is the unit of sale and density is the business model. They work in student accommodation, where floor area constraints are tight and stays are long, and indeed space planning in student housing revolves around the same clear-height and privacy issues. They work in family rooms at three-star hotels and mountain residences, where they let you sell a quad in a room that would otherwise stay a triple.
I wouldn’t put one in a standard hotel room above three stars just to gain a bed. A bunk bed lowers the perceived category disproportionately against the extra revenue it brings, and in the room type codes a quad with a bunk bed already reads to the market as a different product, at a lower rate per person.
There’s also the matter of floor area. Regional regulations set minimum square metres based on the number of beds, not the number of physical bed frames: a bunk bed in a room brings two, and the minimum square metres for rooms need recalculating accordingly. Adding a bunk bed to a room already at the limit can push it out of compliance, and that’s a mistake that surfaces at classification, meaning too late. Base widths match those of standard beds, so standard hotel bed dimensions remain the reference here too, with 90×200 as the dominant size and 120×200 used in bunk beds with a double bottom bunk.
On cost, a certified metal contract bunk bed for professional use runs indicatively between €450 and €900 in 2026, rising to €1,100 or €1,600 with panelling, curtains, sockets and individual lights. Made-to-measure wooden models, used in higher-tier properties, easily exceed €2,000. The cost needs weighing over the eight to ten years of working life a contract frame delivers.
Frequently asked questions
How tall does a bunk bed need to be?
The total height of a two-tier bunk bed generally runs from 160 to 180 centimetres, but the figure that matters is the clear space above the top mattress, which should be at least 75 centimetres and ideally 90. Achieving that needs a ceiling of at least 250 centimetres, better 270. The bottom bunk needs 95 or 110 centimetres of clear height from the mattress to the structure above.
Are guard rails mandatory?
Yes, on the top bunk the EN 747 standard requires rails on all sides, with only the openings needed for access. The top edge of the rail needs to be at least 16 centimetres above the mattress surface, so compliance also depends on the thickness of the mattress installed. Every manufacturer states the maximum height allowed, and exceeding it voids the bed’s certification.
From what age can a child sleep on the top bunk?
Compliant bunk beds carry a warning that the top bunk isn’t suitable for children under six years old. It’s in the property’s interest to respect that and communicate it at booking stage, arranging an additional floor-level bed or a cot for families with young children. It’s also not recommended for anyone who sleepwalks or has epileptic seizures.
How much weight does a contract bunk bed hold?
Professional-grade models generally state 120 to 150 kilograms per bunk, with some metal hostel-grade frames reaching 200. Ask the supplier for the load capacity per single bunk for professional use, specifying whether the figure is static or dynamic.
