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UK Take-Home Pay

Calculation methodology

The calculator estimates annual Income Tax for tax year 2026/27. It uses one employment. With no pension selected, the salary is treated as adjusted net income, and Gift Aid, taxable benefits and other reliefs are not included. Reviewed on 19 October 2026 for that case only.

Estimate vs payslip · Tax codes · National Insurance · Official sources

Personal Allowance

The standard allowance is £12,570. Above £100,000 it falls by £1 for every £2. At £125,140 the allowance is £0. An odd pound of income above £100,000 does not remove a further £1, because the reduction is counted in whole pounds.

Bands

Tax is charged on taxable income, which is salary minus the allowance that remains. The band widths stay fixed while the allowance tapers. England, Wales and Northern Ireland use 20%, 40% and 45%. Scotland uses 19%, 20%, 21%, 42%, 45% and 48%. Income above £125,140 uses 45% or the Scottish 48% rate. The published phrase “over £125,141” is not used as a gap of £1.

Student Loans

A Student Loan uses the same weekly or monthly gross as Category A National Insurance. That figure is the pay used for secondary Class 1 National Insurance, not taxable income. The deduction is the amount above the 2026/27 threshold for the plan you select, multiplied by 9% for Plan 1, 2, 4 or 5, or by 6% for a Postgraduate Loan, then rounded down to the nearest pound. No plan is selected unless you choose one. An annual salary is not treated as one loan period.

The published method is the payroll specification from 6 April 2026 and the 2026 to 2027 SL3 deduction tables. Day-count periods, more than one undergraduate plan, and protected earnings are not calculated.

Pensions

A pension is calculated only when you choose salary sacrifice, net pay or relief at source, and you choose qualifying earnings, full salary or your own pensionable pay. No percentage is assumed. The calculation uses the same weekly or monthly gross as Category A National Insurance.

Salary sacrifice reduces the cash used for Income Tax, National Insurance and a Student Loan. The employer pays the sacrificed amount into the pension, and that amount is not deducted again. Legal eligibility is not assessed, because hours, age and the minimum-wage rate are not known. Net pay reduces the pay used for Income Tax and leaves National Insurance and the Student Loan on the gross. Relief at source leaves taxable pay at the full salary. Adjusted net income is reduced by the gross contribution, and that amount also extends the rate limits used for the annual Income Tax figure. In Scotland the starter-rate limit is not extended. The extra relief is not a monthly or weekly PAYE deduction. Gift Aid is not included.

The published method is described by The Pensions Regulator’s 2026/27 earnings thresholds, relief at source and salary sacrifice, adjusted net income and the rate-limit extension. A percentage that is not a whole number of pence is rejected. The 6 April 2029 National Insurance cap is not applied.

Category A National Insurance by pay period

Employee National Insurance on this site is Category A only, for one weekly or monthly earnings period. It uses the published weekly or monthly primary threshold and upper earnings limit from the GOV.UK employer rates and thresholds for 2026 to 2027. For 2026/27 the monthly primary threshold is £1,048 and the monthly upper earnings limit is £4,189. The exact-percentage method rounds to the nearest penny and disregards a halfpenny or less, following regulation 12(1) of the Social Security (Contributions) Regulations 2001.

An annualised presentation — for example 8% of annual earnings above £12,570, then divided by 12 — is a different method. It can differ from the period calculation by a few pence. This product does not treat an annualised National Insurance figure as the verified engine result. Repeating a monthly period deduction twelve times is labelled as a projection, not an HMRC annual National Insurance assessment. The £30,000 after tax page works through one monthly example in full.

Estimated take-home pay

The period estimate starts from gross pay. A salary sacrifice is removed once. Income Tax in the estimate is the annual liability taken to the nearest penny for one period. An exact half penny is rounded up. That amount is an estimated annual-tax equivalent, not PAYE withholding. Category A National Insurance, a selected Student Loan and a Postgraduate Loan use that pay period and their own rounding. Net pay and relief at source then deduct the employee cash only. The employer contribution and the provider’s basic-rate top-up are not deducted. Further pension relief is not added back as money already received.

If a required pay period is missing, or a verified deduction cannot be calculated, the estimate is not shown. See estimate versus payslip for why the figure is not guaranteed take-home pay.

Estimate versus a PAYE payslip

TakeHomeFigures builds an estimate for one regular week or month when the verified parts can be combined. It is not your employer’s payroll run and it is not an exact payslip.

What this site calculates

What employers calculate under PAYE

Your employer (or pension payer) uses the tax code HMRC has issued for that job, the pay period, and usually the cumulative pay and tax since 6 April. HMRC’s payroll manuals describe free-pay or additional-pay amounts for the tax week or tax month, and Tax Tables used for payday withholding. That process can produce a different Income Tax deduction from an annual liability split into equal periods. Official employer guidance for 2026 to 2027 includes CWG2 (Further guide to PAYE and National Insurance).

Why the Income Tax line can differ

Dividing annual tax by 12 or 52 — or taking it to the nearest penny for one period — is an annual-tax equivalent. It does not rebuild cumulative PAYE, week-1 / month-1 treatment, starter checklist codes, benefits in the code, or refunds and catch-ups after a pay change. Even when twelve equal months multiply back to the annual total, a real payslip can still show a different tax amount in a given month.

Why National Insurance depends on the period

Category A National Insurance uses weekly or monthly primary thresholds and upper earnings limits. The same yearly salary paid weekly is not assessed as one annual National Insurance period on this site. An annualised “8% above £12,570, then divide” figure can differ by a few pence from the period method — see Category A National Insurance.

What else can change a payslip

Tax codes, cumulative adjustments, bonuses, overtime, unpaid leave, other jobs, taxable benefits, payroll timing, union fees, salary sacrifice arrangements not modelled here, and deductions outside this calculator can all change net pay. The estimate should not be presented as guaranteed take-home pay.

Worked illustration — £30,000 a year, paid monthly

Using the same approved engines as the homepage default (England / Northern Ireland bands, Category A National Insurance, no pension, no Student Loan):

In this equal-month example, twelve times £290.50 returns £3,486.00. That still does not make £290.50 a PAYE deduction. A payslip can differ once cumulative tax, code changes or irregular pay apply. Full narrative: £30,000 after tax.

Tax codes and payroll periods

A tax code tells your employer how to operate PAYE for that employment. It is not itself the annual Income Tax calculation. HMRC issues the code; this site does not invent one from your salary. GOV.UK tax codes overview.

1257L, S1257L and C1257L

For 2026 to 2027 the basic Personal Allowance is £12,570 across the UK. P9X (tax codes from 6 April 2026) confirms that figure and states that the emergency code is 1257L for all employees. GOV.UK describes 1257L as the code currently used for most people with one job or pension when they are entitled to the standard Personal Allowance (letter L).

Selecting a region here chooses the matching standard code label and the matching annual bands. It does not prove that your payslip uses that code, or that every person with 1257L receives identical PAYE deductions.

Tax code versus the tax calculation

The numbers in a suffix code relate to tax-free pay HMRC has coded for that source. The employer then applies PAYE rules for the period. This site’s Income Tax figure is an annual liability estimate using the standard allowance and bands for the region you select. It is not a reconstruction of free-pay tables for every payday.

Emergency codes W1, M1 and X

You are on an emergency tax code if the code ends in W1 (weekly pay), M1 (monthly pay) or X (varying pay dates). NONCUM on a payslip can mean the same non-cumulative basis. On an emergency code, tax is usually based on that week or month only, as if you were paid that amount every period — which can mean too much or too little tax until HMRC updates the code. Official explanation: emergency tax codes. Employer thresholds for 2026 to 2027 list the emergency codes as 1257L W1, 1257L M1 and 1257L X.

TakeHomeFigures does not calculate emergency or week-1 / month-1 PAYE deductions.

Other codes (not calculated here)

Codes such as BR, D0, D1, 0T, NT and K (and their Scottish or Welsh forms where published) need extra PAYE rules — for example basic-rate on all pay for BR, no allowance for 0T, or adding amount for a K code. GOV.UK summarises the letters on what your tax code means and employer tax-code letters. Those deductions are outside the verified engines on this site.

How to check your tax code

Check your payslip, a Tax Code Notice from HMRC, the HMRC app, or check your Income Tax for the current year (sign-in required). If you think the code is wrong, follow GOV.UK guidance if you think your tax code is wrong.

What is left out

Other National Insurance categories, emergency tax codes, non-standard codes (BR, D0, D1, 0T, NT, K and related forms), and PAYE withholding tables are not calculated. A Student Loan, Postgraduate Loan or pension runs only when you select it. Dividing the annual tax by 12 or 52 is shown only when it lands on a whole penny, and it is labelled as a split of the annual total rather than a payroll deduction.

Arithmetic uses whole pounds and integer pence. A slice of taxable income in pounds, multiplied by a whole-number percentage, is the tax in pence. No floating-point rounding is applied.