Companion Guide to Code on Accessibility 2025

Singapore's Building and Construction Authority (BCA) launched the Companion Guide to the Code on Accessibility in the Built Environment 2025 to help Qualified Persons exceed the Code's mandatory baseline. The Companion Guide gives non-mandatory design recommendations and enhanced features that promote user-centric accessibility; it supplements the Code and does not convert recommendations into a new statutory minimum (BCA circular APPBCA-2026-04, 2 March 2026).

Relationship to the mandatory Code

The Code on Accessibility 2025 was launched in April 2025 and was streamlined to focus on mandatory requirements, giving Qualified Persons a clearer baseline for accessibility in the built environment. BCA's companion publication addresses the next design question: how a project can provide more user-centred and inclusive features than that baseline requires (BCA circular APPBCA-2026-04, 2 March 2026). The two documents should therefore be read together, but compliance with the Code should not be described as proof that every recommendation in the Companion Guide has been adopted.

Intended users and design approach

The Companion Guide is intended primarily to support Qualified Persons involved in the design of Singapore's built environment. BCA describes it as a practical resource for exceeding baseline standards through user-centric accessibility and encourages industry adoption of the best practices in the guide (BCA Universal Design Guides, accessed 2 September 2026). Its design approach is broader than checking a single minimum dimension: BCA's Universal Design materials frame accessible places as environments that are useful and usable by people with diverse abilities, preferences and modes of movement.

Evidence and provenance of the recommendations

The Companion Guide consolidates insights from the Code Review Committee, feedback from industry and the public, research findings and current design trends. This provenance explains why the guide contains recommendations and enhanced features rather than a replacement statutory text: the publication translates accumulated design and user evidence into guidance for project teams (BCA circular APPBCA-2026-04, 2 March 2026). A recommendation in the guide is consequently evidence-informed design advice, not by itself a planning approval, building-control exemption or licence.

How to use the guide's status correctly

BCA makes the Companion Guide available for viewing and download through its Universal Design Guides resources and encourages Qualified Persons and industry stakeholders to adopt its best practices. For a project-specific decision, the mandatory Code, applicable building-control requirements and the Qualified Person's professional judgement remain separate reference points (BCA Universal Design Guides, accessed 2 September 2026). The safe interpretation is therefore “recommended enhancement beyond the baseline”, not “new universal legal requirement” or “automatic approval for an accessible design”.