The How to Rent guide: what replaced it, and what landlords in England must give tenants now

The How to Rent guide is no longer something a landlord in England gives to a new tenant. The government withdrew it on 1 May 2026, the day the Renters' Rights Act tenancy reforms took effect. New tenancies now start with written information about the key terms, and existing tenants were due a government document called the Renters' Rights Act Information Sheet 2026 by 31 May 2026. The GOV.UK page for the old guide now says it “has been retained for tenancies where the landlord served a notice for possession under section 21 before 1 May 2026.” If you are checking a tenancy that began before then, the old rules below still tell you whether it was set up properly.

What the How to Rent guide was

How to rent: the checklist for renting in England was a government booklet explaining a private tenant's rights and responsibilities. From 1 October 2015, regulation 3 of the Assured Shorthold Tenancy Notices and Prescribed Requirements (England) Regulations 2015 required the landlord of an assured shorthold tenancy in England, or an agent acting for them, to give the tenant the version “that has effect for the time being”. In practice that meant the current edition on the day the tenancy began. The last edition was published in October 2023.

Three details of the old rule still matter when you audit a pre-May 2026 file:

• How it could be served. On paper, or by email only where the tenant had given the landlord or agent an email address at which they were content to accept notices and documents about the tenancy. An email to an address the tenant never nominated for service was not enough.
• New editions during a tenancy. A landlord did not have to hand over a fresh copy each time a new version was published mid-tenancy.
• Replacement tenancies. No new copy was needed on a replacement tenancy if the tenant had already been given the same version that was current on the first day of the new one. If the edition had changed in between, the new edition had to be given.

Why it mattered: the section 21 link

The guide carried no fine of its own. Its force came from section 21B of the Housing Act 1988, inserted by section 39 of the Deregulation Act 2015: a section 21 notice could not be given while the landlord was in breach of the requirement. A section 21 notice served while the guide was missing was not validly given. The same regulations put the gas safety record and the EPC on the same footing through regulation 2, which is why many agents handed the three over together at move-in.

What changed on 1 May 2026

From 1 May 2026 the 2015 regulations were revoked for private assured tenancies, and according to the government's overview for landlords existing assured shorthold tenancies became assured periodic tenancies, and a landlord can no longer evict using the section 21 process. Possession now needs a section 8 notice relying on one or more grounds.

A section 21 notice served before 1 May 2026 did not become invalid overnight. Under the Act's transitional rules, if no court claim had been requested, the claim had to be requested within the notice's usual time limit or within three months of 1 May 2026, whichever ended first. Where it was, the notice stays valid until the proceedings end. In those cases the old guide, and whether it was given, can still matter.

What tenants must be given now

New tenancies from 1 May 2026

Landlords must give written information about the key terms of the tenancy before the tenancy agreement is signed or the tenancy is otherwise agreed. It can sit inside a written tenancy agreement or be given separately, and the government has published the list of what it must contain. Missing it can lead to a fine of up to £7,000.

Tenancies that existed before 1 May 2026

Where there was a written tenancy agreement or other written record of the terms, the landlord did not need to reissue it. Instead, every tenant named on the agreement had to be given the Renters' Rights Act Information Sheet 2026 by 31 May 2026, with a fine of up to £7,000 for failing to. Where a letting agent manages the property, GOV.UK says the agent must have given it, even if the landlord has as well. Lodgers do not need it. Where a pre-May tenancy was purely verbal, the Information Sheet cannot be used; the landlord had to give the written information about key terms by the same date instead.

The Information Sheet is still being given today in one situation. Where a section 21 or section 8 notice given before 1 May 2026 later stops being valid, or the court process finishes without possession, the tenancy becomes an assured periodic tenancy. If it has written terms, the landlord then has one month to give the Information Sheet.

How to serve the Information Sheet

The GOV.UK page for the Information Sheet sets out how it must be given:

• It must be the exact PDF from that page, which says the sheet is only valid when downloaded from there.
• Give it on paper, posted or handed over, or send the PDF itself as an attachment to an email or text message.
• Sending a link to the PDF is not valid service.
• A copy goes to every tenant named on the tenancy agreement.

The record to keep

Every one of these rules turns on a date and a method, and a tenant, council or court will ask for both. For each tenancy, keep:

• Tenancies begun before 1 May 2026: which How to Rent edition was given, the date, to whom, and whether by hand, post or email (and, for email, the tenant's notice of the address they accept documents at).
• Existing tenancies: the date the Information Sheet went to each named tenant, the method, and a copy of the email or covering letter showing the PDF attached.
• New tenancies: the written terms as given, dated before the signing date.
• Alongside them: the gas safety record and EPC given at the start, and the deposit protection certificate and prescribed information. Deposit compliance still matters for possession: the government overview says a court will only make a possession order where the deposit was protected and the tenant given the correct information, or one of the other conditions it lists applies.

The rest of what changed for periodic tenancies is in tenancies after the Renters' Rights Act, and the full list of start-of-tenancy duties is in the landlord compliance checklist.

In Verixad the tenancy record holds the deposit protection date and the date the deposit prescribed information was served. A copy of the documents you gave can be filed on the property, and a dated note on the tenancy records who received them and how. Serving the Information Sheet still means paper or the PDF as an attachment. See how tenancies and documents work.