UK Income Tax Calculator (2026/27)
England, Wales, Northern Ireland or Scotland. Enter your salary — no button, results update as you type.
Before deductions. Salary/pension income only — this tool does not model self-employment profit, savings interest, dividends, property income or capital gains. National Insurance is not included (Income Tax only).
Reduces taxable income directly (net pay/salary sacrifice mechanic). Relief-at-source pensions work differently and aren’t modeled here — see the methodology notes below.
We don’t check your partner’s income against the real eligibility rule (they must not be a higher/additional/advanced/top-rate taxpayer) — apply it only if you already know you qualify.
UK Income Tax Calculator (2026/27)
This calculator estimates your 2026/27 UK Income Tax — the tax year running from 6 April 2026 to 5 April 2027. Enter your gross salary and the numbers update immediately; there’s nothing to submit and nothing to sign up for. It handles both the rest-of-UK (England, Wales, Northern Ireland) three-band system and Scotland’s six-band system, the £12,570 Personal Allowance and its income-related taper above £100,000, pension contributions, Blind Person’s Allowance, and Marriage Allowance — showing your taxable income, tax by band, and exact take-home pay, both annually and monthly.
The Personal Allowance and Why It Shrinks Above £100,000
Everyone gets a £12,570 tax-free Personal Allowance in 2026/27, frozen at this level (along with the £50,270 higher-rate threshold) until April 2031 under the Autumn Budget 2025 — so unlike most tax-free amounts, this one isn’t rising with inflation for several more years.
Once your adjusted net income (broadly, your total taxable income minus pension contributions and Gift Aid) passes £100,000, your Personal Allowance shrinks by £1 for every £2 you earn above that threshold — disappearing entirely at £125,140. Because you’re losing tax-free allowance and paying 40% (or 42% in Scotland) tax on the same extra pound, income between £100,000 and £125,140 in the rest of the UK carries an effective marginal rate of 60% — higher than the official 45% additional rate that only applies above £125,140. This is one of the most misunderstood corners of UK Income Tax, and this calculator applies the taper automatically so you can see the real effect on your own numbers.
England, Wales & Northern Ireland — 2026/27 Bands
| Band | Taxable income (with full £12,570 allowance) | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| Basic rate | £12,571 – £50,270 | 20% |
| Higher rate | £50,271 – £125,140 | 40% |
| Additional rate | Over £125,140 | 45% |
Wales has its own devolved power to set different rates (the Welsh Rate of Income Tax), but has kept its rates identical to England and Northern Ireland every year since devolution — so all three nations use the same table.
Scotland — 2026/27 Bands (Six Rates)
| Band | Taxable income (with full £12,570 allowance) | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| Starter rate | £12,571 – £16,537 | 19% |
| Basic rate | £16,538 – £29,526 | 20% |
| Intermediate rate | £29,527 – £43,662 | 21% |
| Higher rate | £43,663 – £75,000 | 42% |
| Advanced rate | £75,001 – £125,140 | 45% |
| Top rate | Over £125,140 | 48% |
Your Income Tax residence is based on where your main home is, not where you work — live in Scotland and you pay Scottish rates even if your employer is based in London, and vice versa. Scottish rates only apply to non-savings, non-dividend income (salary, pension, self-employment profit) — interest and dividends are always taxed at rest-of-UK rates regardless of where you live, since the Scottish Parliament has no power over savings or dividend taxation.
The two systems produce meaningfully different bills. Take a £60,000 salary with no other adjustments: in England, Wales or Northern Ireland that’s £11,432.00 in tax (19.05% effective, 40% marginal). In Scotland, the same salary produces £13,182.05 (21.97% effective, 42% marginal) — £1,750.05 more, because Scotland’s Higher rate (42%) starts at a lower income than rUK’s (£43,663 vs £50,271) and is itself a higher percentage.
How We Calculate Your Tax
- Start with your gross annual salary (monthly/weekly entries are annualized first).
- Subtract any pension contribution you enter (net pay/salary sacrifice mechanic) to get your adjusted net income — this is also the figure used for the £100,000 taper test.
- Taper the £12,570 Personal Allowance: reduced by £1 for every £2 of adjusted net income above £100,000, down to £0 at £125,140.
- Add Blind Person’s Allowance (£3,250) if you’ve ticked it — this is added after the taper and is never itself reduced by it.
- Add or subtract Marriage Allowance (£1,260) depending on whether you’re receiving or giving it away — also untouched by the taper.
- What’s left after subtracting your total allowance from adjusted net income is your taxable income, which runs through the rUK or Scottish bands above, one slice at a time, to give your total tax.
Worked Example
Take someone in England earning £60,000/year who contributes £5,000/year to a workplace pension via salary sacrifice. Adjusted net income is £55,000 (below the £100,000 taper threshold, so the full £12,570 Personal Allowance applies), leaving £42,430 taxable. Running that through the rUK bands: 20% on the first £37,700 (£7,540.00), and 40% on the remaining £4,730 (£1,892.00) — £9,432.00 total tax, an effective rate of 15.72% and a marginal rate of 40%. Net take-home: £45,568.00/year, or £3,797.33/month — noticeably better than the £48,568.00 they’d take home with no pension contribution at all, once you account for the £5,000 that went into the pension instead of their pocket.
Blind Person’s Allowance & Marriage Allowance Explained
Blind Person’s Allowance adds £3,250 to your Personal Allowance for 2026/27 if you’re registered severely sight-impaired (or, in Scotland/Northern Ireland, meet the equivalent local registration). Unlike the standard Personal Allowance, it is never reduced by the £100,000 taper — even someone earning £500,000 gets the full £3,250 if they qualify.
Marriage Allowance lets a spouse or civil partner with income below their own £12,570 Personal Allowance transfer £1,260 of it to their partner, worth up to £252/year to the couple. The receiving partner must be a basic-rate taxpayer in the rest of the UK, or starter/basic/intermediate rate in Scotland — it can’t be claimed if they’re already paying higher, additional, advanced or top rate. This calculator applies the adjustment if you toggle it on, but doesn’t independently verify your partner’s income against that eligibility rule.
Who Should Use This Calculator?
Anyone in the UK with salary or pension income who wants a fast, realistic answer to “what will I actually take home” — before accepting a job offer, negotiating a raise, deciding how much to put into a workplace pension, or just understanding a payslip. It’s built for salary/pension income specifically: it doesn’t model self-employment profit, savings interest, dividends, property income or capital gains, and it doesn’t include National Insurance (a separate tax with its own thresholds).
What This Calculator Doesn’t Cover
In the interest of accuracy over false precision: this tool doesn’t model National Insurance (a separate deduction — see HMRC’s own combined estimator linked below for that), Married Couple’s Allowance (only available where one partner was born before 6 April 1935), student loan repayments, or relief-at-source pension contributions (where your pension provider claims basic-rate relief and your basic-rate band is extended — genuinely different arithmetic from the net-pay/salary-sacrifice mechanic modeled here). It also doesn’t cover savings interest, dividends, self-employment profit, property income or capital gains, all of which have their own allowances and rates.
Cross-Checked Against HMRC’s Own Calculator
We ran identical scenarios through HMRC’s own official Estimate your Income Tax tool. Every Personal Allowance figure and every basic/starter/intermediate-rate band matched to the exact penny. In the top band of each test, our figures differed from HMRC’s by a very small amount (under 0.03% of gross income) — this is because HMRC’s tool simulates real payroll withholding (which rounds allowances and bands to whole pounds at each monthly pay period), while this calculator computes your full-year tax directly in one pass, the same approach used by essentially every “enter your salary, see your tax” calculator. Both are legitimate; a P800 or Self Assessment reconciliation converges on the clean annual figure this calculator shows.
Important Tax-Year Information
Tax year: 2026/27 (6 April 2026 to 5 April 2027). Last verified against official sources: 2026-09-08. This calculator will be updated, re-tested, and re-dated whenever HMRC, the Scottish Government, or new legislation changes any figure it uses — the Personal Allowance and rUK higher-rate threshold are currently frozen through April 2031, but Scotland reviews its own thresholds annually.
Official Sources
- GOV.UK — Income Tax rates and Personal Allowances
- GOV.UK — Income Tax in Scotland
- gov.scot — Scottish Income Tax 2026-27 Technical Factsheet
- GOV.UK — Marriage Allowance
- The Income Tax (Indexation of Blind Person’s Allowance and Married Couple’s Allowance) Order 2026 No. 38
- GOV.UK — Estimate your Income Tax (official HMRC tool)
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the UK Income Tax bands for 2026/27?
For England, Wales and Northern Ireland: 0% up to the £12,570 Personal Allowance, 20% up to £50,270, 40% up to £125,140, and 45% above that. Scotland has six bands: 0%, 19%, 20%, 21%, 42%, 45% and 48%, with the same £12,570 and £125,140 boundaries at each end.
Why does my Personal Allowance go down as I earn more?
Above £100,000 adjusted net income, your £12,570 Personal Allowance is reduced by £1 for every £2 earned above that threshold, reaching £0 at £125,140 — creating an effective 60% marginal rate on income in that band (in rUK) since you lose allowance and pay 40% tax on the same pound.
Do I pay Scottish or rest-of-UK Income Tax?
Based on where your main home is, not where you work. Savings interest and dividends are always taxed at rest-of-UK rates regardless of residence, since only salary/pension/self-employment income is devolved to Scotland.
How does Marriage Allowance work?
A spouse or civil partner earning below their own £12,570 Personal Allowance can transfer £1,260 of it to a basic-rate-taxpayer partner, worth up to £252/year to the couple.
Does this calculator include National Insurance?
No — this is an Income Tax calculator only. Use HMRC’s own Estimate your Income Tax tool at gov.uk/estimate-income-tax for a combined view including National Insurance.
This calculator provides an estimate based on the tax rules and assumptions stated above. It models salary/pension income only — not self-employment profit, savings interest, dividends, property income or capital gains — and does not include National Insurance, Married Couple’s Allowance, student loan repayments, or relief-at-source pension relief. Your actual tax liability may differ depending on your personal circumstances. Check GOV.UK or a qualified tax adviser for advice about your specific situation.
