Create a Non-Compete Agreement Online for the UK: What's Actually Enforceable
TL;DR: Before you create non-compete agreement online United Kingdom employers should understand that the starting position is against you. Under the common law restraint of trade doctrine, and the Nordenfeltprinciple it rests on, a post-termination restriction is void unless it protects a legitimate proprietary interest and goes no further than reasonably necessary. There is still no statutory cap on duration, despite what a lot of 2026 commentary implies.
Rising job mobility is keeping this a consistently searched category among UK employers through 2026. Almost every template answering it is drafted as though breadth were strength, which gets the law exactly backwards.
The starting point, stated plainly. A clause restraining someone from working after their employment ends is void as a restraint of trade unless the employer can justify it. The burden sits on the party seeking to enforce. This is the Nordenfelt principle: all restraints of trade are contrary to public policy and therefore void, unless reasonable by reference both to the parties' interests and to the public interest. A restraint is not presumed valid and trimmed where excessive; it is presumed invalid until shown to be reasonable.
The Enforceability Test Under the Restraint of Trade Doctrine
Is there a legitimate proprietary interest to protect? This threshold defeats most covenants before reasonableness is reached. Recognised interests include trade secrets and genuinely confidential information, trade connections such as customer and supplier relationships, and in some cases the stability of the workforce.
Is protection from competition itself a legitimate interest? No. This is the single most important point and the one templates ignore. An employer has no protectable interest in simply not being competed with. If the only purpose is to stop a former employee competing, the covenant fails at step one however modestly drafted.
Is the restraint no wider than reasonably necessary in scope? The activities restricted must relate to what the employee actually did. A restriction covering the employer's whole business, imposed on someone who worked in one part of it, is wider than necessary.
Is it reasonable in duration? Judged against how long the protected interest genuinely lasts. Customer connections fade and confidential information goes stale. The question is how long the employer needs, not how long it would prefer.
Is it reasonable in geography? The area must correspond to where the employee's activities and the employer's interest actually reach. A worldwide clause on a locally operating employee is plainly excessive; a tightly drawn area around a genuine trading footprint is defensible.
Is it reasonable between the parties and in the public interest? Seniority, knowledge and bargaining position all matter. A restraint appropriate for a senior executive with real client relationships may be unreasonable for a junior employee doing similar work in name only.
The reform that has not happened
Because a great deal of commentary suggests otherwise, this is worth stating precisely.
The Government has proposed limiting non-compete clauses, and a three-month statutory cap has been discussed for several years. In November 2025 it published a working paper inviting views on options for reform, with the consultation closing on 18 February 2026. The options canvassed went wider than a flat three months, including a cap varying by employer size, a ban below a salary threshold, and an outright prohibition.
None of it is law. No statutory cap on non-compete duration is in force, any change requires primary legislation, and no timetable has been fixed. Business sale covenants, which are judged more generously than employment ones, were in any event outside the proposals.
The practical advice is unchanged by the consultation, but it is reinforced by it: keep restraints as short and targeted as you reasonably can, because that is both what the current law requires and what any future reform is likely to demand.
What happens when a covenant is too wide
This is where the "draft it broadly and see" approach fails.
A court will not generally rewrite an unreasonable restraint into a reasonable one. Limited severance of clearly separable wording is sometimes possible, following the approach the Supreme Court took in Tillman v Egon Zehnder Ltd [2019] UKSC 32, but it cannot be relied on and will not rescue a clause whose whole scope is excessive. The realistic outcome of overreaching is that the covenant is unenforceable in its entirety, leaving the employer with nothing at exactly the moment it wanted protection.
So the incentive runs opposite to intuition. A narrow, well-justified covenant you can actually enforce is worth far more than a broad one that collapses.
5 Mistakes That Make a Non-Compete Unenforceable
Applying the same covenant to everyone. A standard clause in every contract regardless of role is the clearest evidence it was not tailored to a legitimate interest. Reserve restraints for people whose departure genuinely threatens something protectable.
Restricting an entire industry. Preventing someone working "in financial services" or "in any competing business" is almost always wider than any interest can justify.
Choosing a duration by habit. Twelve months because that is what the template said, rather than because that is how long the customer connection or information retains value.
Using the covenant as a confidentiality clause. If the concern is information, protect the information. A confidentiality obligation and a restraint on working are different tools, and dressing one as the other tends to lose both.
Adding it after employment began, for nothing. A restraint introduced mid-employment needs consideration. Continued employment alone may not be enough, so give something identifiable in return, such as a payment or promotion, or execute the variation as a deed.
5 Steps to Draft One That Holds Up
Identify the interest in writing before drafting. Name it: these customers, this information, this team. If you cannot name it, you do not have a covenant, and drafting one wastes the opportunity to protect what you can.
Match the restriction to the role. Restrict the activities the person actually performed and the customers they actually dealt with.
Set duration by reference to the interest. Ask how long it takes for the connection to fade or the information to lose value, and use that.
Draft the geography to the actual footprint. Where the employee operated and where the interest exists, not everywhere the business might one day go.
Layer the protections. A confidentiality clause, a non-solicitation clause, a non-dealing clause and, only where genuinely justified, a non-compete. Layering means that if the widest restriction fails, the narrower ones may still stand, which is the closest thing to insurance available here.
Non-solicitation and non-dealing: usually the better tools
Employers reach for a non-compete because it is the term they have heard of. In most cases what they actually want is narrower and considerably easier to enforce.
A non-solicitation clause prevents a former employee approaching the employer's customers to take their business. A non-dealing clause goes further and prevents them dealing with those customers even where the customer approached them. Both can be tied to specific customers the employee personally dealt with in a defined period before leaving, which makes them precise, evidently connected to a real interest and much more defensible than a general prohibition on working.
A non-poaching clause restricting recruitment of former colleagues addresses workforce stability, which can in some circumstances be a protectable interest.
Ask what the actual fear is. If it is losing customers, a non-solicitation or non-dealing clause addresses it directly. If it is information leaving, a confidentiality clause does. A general non-compete is the blunt instrument you reach for when you have not identified which of these worries you, and its bluntness is why it fails.
What enforcement involves in practice
Enforcing a restraint usually means seeking an interim injunction, quickly. Speed matters because a court weighing whether to restrain someone from working will consider the effect on their livelihood, and delay by the employer undermines any claim that the restraint is genuinely necessary.
That has a drafting consequence. The covenant must be clear enough to be enforced at short notice on limited evidence. A clause requiring lengthy argument about what it means will not deliver urgent relief, whatever its eventual merits. Garden leave, where notice periods allow, is worth considering alongside a covenant rather than instead of thinking about one.
FAQ
Are non-compete clauses enforceable in the UK?
They can be, but they are void unless the employer shows a legitimate proprietary interest and a restraint no wider than reasonably necessary in scope, duration and geography.
Is there a three-month legal limit on non-competes?
No. It was consulted on, with the consultation closing in February 2026, but no statutory cap is in force and any change needs primary legislation.
Is preventing competition a legitimate interest?
No. Protection from competition alone is not protectable. The interest must be something like trade secrets, confidential information or customer connections.
Will a court narrow a clause that is too wide?
Generally not. Limited severance is sometimes possible following Tillman v Egon Zehnder Ltd [2019] UKSC 32, but the realistic outcome of overreaching is that the whole covenant fails.
Can I add a non-compete to an existing employee's contract?
Only with consideration. Continued employment alone may not suffice, so give something identifiable or execute the variation as a deed.
The pattern to take away is that restraint drafting rewards restraint. Every additional month, every extra activity and every widened geography moves the clause closer to being void in its entirety, and the employer that asks for less usually ends up with something it can actually use.
Key takeaways
A restraint is void unless justified, and the burden is on the employer.
Protection from competition by itself is not a legitimate interest.
No statutory cap on duration exists; the proposed three-month limit is consultation, not law.
Overreaching usually loses the whole clause rather than producing a trimmed one.
Non-solicitation and non-dealing clauses are easier to enforce and often achieve the real objective.
Draft an enforceable non-compete with Ask.Legal for the UK
This article is general information about the law of England and Wales as at 2026, not legal advice. For advice on your circumstances, consult a qualified solicitor.