Bathroom Electrical Requirements in Plain Terms > analysis

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Bathrooms combine water, bare feet and grounded metal fixtures, which makes them the highest risk room in a house for electric shock. The requirements reflect that.

Ground fault protection is required for all receptacles in a bathroom, without exception. This is the single most important item and has been required for longer than most other locations.

At least one receptacle is required adjacent to each basin, within a specified distance of the outside edge. This exists partly for convenience and partly to discourage running cords from other rooms into a bathroom.

The receptacles must be supplied by a dedicated twenty amp circuit. There are two acceptable arrangements. Either one circuit serves the receptacles of a single bathroom and may also serve other loads in that same bathroom, or one circuit serves only receptacles and may serve receptacles in multiple bathrooms. What is not acceptable is a circuit that serves bathroom receptacles and also serves outlets in other rooms.

Lighting and exhaust fans have their own considerations. Fixtures installed above or near a tub or shower must be rated for damp or wet locations depending on their exact position, and there are zones around the tub and shower where certain equipment is not permitted at all.

Exhaust fans are worth mentioning beyond the electrical requirements, because a fan ducted into an attic rather than to the exterior creates a moisture problem that eventually becomes a structural one.

Switch locations are restricted so that switches cannot be operated from inside a tub or shower.

Heated floors, towel warmers and similar additions bring their own requirements, usually involving dedicated circuits and specific protection.

The practical point for anyone renovating an older bathroom is that the existing circuit almost certainly does not meet current requirements. Older bathrooms were frequently fed from a bedroom circuit with a single unprotected receptacle. Bringing it up to date means a new home run from the panel, which is easier to do while the walls are open than afterwards.

Anything involving work near a tub or shower is worth checking against current requirements rather than matching what was there.

Further reading: this resource