Take-home pay calculator

A £30,000 salary in England, Wales or Northern Ireland leaves about £25,120 a year for 2026/27, which is £2,093.30 a month. That is after £3,486 of income tax and £1,394 of National Insurance, on the standard 1257L tax code with no pension or student loan. A 5% workplace pension would take about £100 a month off that figure, and a Plan 2 student loan roughly another £5.

A £50,000 salary leaves about £39,520 a year, or £3,293.30 a month, after £7,486 of income tax and £2,994 of National Insurance. £50,000 sits just under the £50,270 higher rate threshold, so every pound is still taxed at 20%. Cross that line and the next slice is taxed at 40%, while National Insurance drops from 8% to 2%.

The usual causes are a change of tax code, a pay rise that pushed part of your salary into the 40% band, the start of student loan repayments after your pay crossed the plan threshold, a new or increased pension contribution, or an emergency code such as 1257L W1/M1 after changing jobs. A bonus paid in the previous month can also make the following payslip look smaller by comparison. Check the tax code on your payslip against your P60 or your HMRC personal tax account.

For most employees it is, because you give up gross pay rather than net pay, so you save income tax and employee National Insurance on the amount sacrificed. A basic rate taxpayer saves 28p in tax and NI for every £1 sacrificed, and a higher rate taxpayer saves 42p. Many employers add their own NI saving to the pension as well. The trade-offs are that your pay for mortgage borrowing, statutory maternity pay and some benefits is based on the lower figure, and pay cannot be sacrificed below the National Minimum Wage.

A bonus paid through payroll is taxed like any other pay: income tax at your marginal rate plus National Insurance at 8% or 2%. On a basic rate salary that is 28% in total, and at the higher rate 42%. A single large bonus can be over-taxed in the month it is paid, because PAYE spreads your allowance evenly across the year and treats one big month as if every month will be that size. It corrects itself in later payslips.

The number is your tax-free allowance with the last digit removed, so 1257L means £12,570 of pay is free of income tax across the year, about £1,047.50 a month. The letter L means the standard allowance. BR taxes all of that income at the basic rate with no allowance, D0 at the higher rate, and a K code adds an amount to your taxable pay to collect tax owed from elsewhere, such as a company car.

Scotland sets its own income tax bands. For 2026/27 there are six: starter 19%, basic 20%, intermediate 21%, higher 42%, advanced 45% and top 48%. The higher rate starts at £43,662 rather than £50,270, so a Scottish taxpayer moves into 42% earlier than the rest of the UK moves into 40%. Below about £30,000 the difference is small and can be slightly in Scotland's favour. National Insurance is not devolved and is the same everywhere.

You repay 9% of everything above your plan threshold: £26,900 on Plan 1, £29,385 on Plan 2, £33,795 on Plan 4 in Scotland and £25,000 on Plan 5. A Postgraduate Loan is separate and takes 6% of everything above £21,000, so someone with both pays two deductions from the same pay. On a £35,000 salary with Plan 2 that is about £42 a month.

No. Employee National Insurance stops from the first payday after you reach State Pension age, and your employer moves you to category C. Income tax is still due on your earnings, so a salary above your personal allowance is still taxed in the normal way. Tick the State Pension age option above to see the effect.

PAYE works one pay period at a time and cumulatively across the year, so a mid-year pay rise, a bonus, a code change or a week 53 payday can all make a single payslip differ from an even annual estimate. Benefits in kind such as private medical cover are usually collected through your code rather than shown as a deduction. This tool shows the annual position, which is what the year should settle at once every payslip is added up.