Calculator · 2026/27
Pay rise calculator
A rise is quoted in gross. You are paid in net. Between the two sits your marginal rate — not your average one — which is why a rise so often lands smaller than it sounded.
Your result
Worked example: £45,000 to £50,000
- The rise, gross
- £5,000
- What the offer says
- In your hand
- £3,600
- 72.0% of it — £300 a month
- Taken in tax and NI
- £1,400
- Your marginal rate is 28%
- Cost to your employer
- £5,750
- £750 of it is employer NI
Your employer spends £5,750 to give you £3,600. The gap is the tax wedge, and it is why a rise costs more to give than it is worth to receive. The wedge, explained →
Where a rise is worth least
The same £5,000 is worth very different amounts depending on where it lands:
| Rise | Gross | In your hand | You keep | Marginal rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| £40,000 → £45,000 | £5,000 | £3,600 | 72.0% | 28% |
| £48,000 → £53,000 | £5,000 | £3,217.80 | 64.4% | 28% |
| £95,000 → £100,000 | £5,000 | £2,900 | 58.0% | 42% |
| £100,000 → £105,000 | £5,000 | £1,900 | 38.0% | 62% |
| £122,000 → £127,000 | £5,000 | £2,179 | 43.6% | 62% |
The £100,000 → £105,000 row is the personal allowance taper. The rise is the same size and you keep barely a third of it. Why →
Where £45,000 sits in the system
Every calculator on this site runs on the same thresholds, and the reason a figure surprises people is almost always that it sits near one of them. This is what is closest to the worked example above — the thresholds that decide what the next pound is worth, rather than what the last one was.
£45,000 sits between two things that matter. £11,205 below you is the Plan 4 (Scotland) repayment threshold, and £5,270 above you is the National Insurance upper earnings limit — so this salary is already past one change and approaching another.
| What changes | At | From here | |
|---|---|---|---|
| National Insurance upper earnings limit | £50,270 | +£5,270 | ahead |
| Higher rate | £50,271 | +£5,271 | ahead |
| Plan 4 (Scotland) repayment threshold | £33,795 | −£11,205 | passed |
Measured against the 2026/27 parameters for England, Wales & Northern Ireland. Distances are on gross pay before any salary sacrifice, because that is the figure every one of these thresholds is tested against.
- £50,270 — Above it your own National Insurance falls from 8% to 2%. That is £5,270 away, and it is the reason the higher rate stings less at the margin than the headline jump suggests.
- £50,271 — Crossing it does not re-tax what you already earn — only the pounds above it move to the higher rate, which is the single most misunderstood thing about UK income tax.
- £33,795 — Plan 4 (Scotland) takes 9% of the £11,205 above its threshold. It is not a tax, but it leaves the same pay on the same day.
What a ten per cent move would do
A swing of ten per cent either way from £45,000 does not cross a single band: the rate on further pay stays at 28% across the whole range from £40,500 to £49,500. That makes this an unusually predictable place to be paid, and it means the arithmetic below scales — a rise of any size in that range is worth the same proportion in your hand.
| If pay moved | Gross | Take-home | Change | Next £100 taxed at |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| −10% | £40,500 | £32,679.60 | −£3,240 | 28% |
| −5% | £42,750 | £34,299.60 | −£1,620 | 28% |
| +5% | £47,250 | £37,539.60 | +£1,620 | 28% |
| +10% | £49,500 | £39,159.60 | +£3,240 | 28% |
And what a pension contribution would buy
There is no threshold within reach below £45,000, so a pension contribution here is not about ducking under anything — it is simply the ordinary trade. Sacrificing £2,500 costs you £1,800 in take-home, because 28% of it was never going to reach you anyway, and puts the full £2,500 into the pot. That is £2,500 of saving for £1,800 of spending power — a ratio of 1.39 to one, and it is the same ratio for every pound until the next band.
Student loans on the same figure
A student loan is not a tax and it is not in any headline rate, but it leaves the same pay packet on the same day — so it belongs in any figure used to make a decision. This is what each plan takes at the worked example above.
Every one of the five repayment thresholds is behind this salary, so whichever plan you are on, you are repaying. Which plan you are on is not a choice, and the difference between them at this salary is £431.55 a year, so it is worth knowing which one your payslip is deducting.
| Plan | Starts at | Repaid a year | A month | Your next £100 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Postgraduate Loan | £21,000 | £1,440 | £120 | 34% |
| Plan 5 | £25,000 | £1,800 | £150 | 37% |
| Plan 1 | £26,900 | £1,629 | £135.75 | 37% |
| Plan 2 | £29,385 | £1,405.35 | £117.11 | 37% |
| Plan 4 (Scotland) | £33,795 | £1,008.45 | £84.04 | 37% |
A postgraduate loan is repaid alongside an undergraduate one rather than instead of it, so someone with both pays both.
One engine behind all eleven
Every calculator on this site runs the same tax engine, and the engine file your browser downloads is byte-identical to the one that generated these pages — a test asserts it, because two implementations of a tax rule is one too many. So the figures here cannot disagree with the salary tables, the hourly pages or any other calculator: they are the same arithmetic asked a different question. The method page sets out how the bands are discovered rather than typed, and sources lists every parameter with the government page and the date it was read from.
Questions people actually ask
How much of a pay rise do I actually keep?
Everything above your current salary is taxed at your marginal rate, so you keep whatever is left. Going from £45,000 to £50,000 you keep £3,600 of £5,000 — 72.0%. Between £100,001 and £125,140 you would keep 38%.
Will a pay rise put me in a higher tax bracket and leave me worse off?
Not from income tax — only the income above the threshold is taxed at the higher rate, so more gross is always more net. The genuine exceptions are benefit cliffs: free childcare in England ends abruptly at £100,000 rather than tapering, and a family using it can be worse off after a small rise past that line.
Should I ask for a pension contribution instead of a rise?
In a high marginal band, often yes. A rise is taxed at your marginal rate and costs your employer 15% in National Insurance on top; the same money sacrificed into a pension is charged neither. Work out the difference →
What this calculation assumes
- 2026/27 rates for England, Wales & Northern Ireland.
- One employment, paid through payroll, taxed on the standard code with no adjustments carried in.
- Employment income only — no dividends, savings interest, rental or self-employment income.
- No taxable benefits in kind, no company car, no unpaid leave.
- National Insurance category A: the standard case for an employee over 21 and under State Pension age.
- Income Tax is annual, but National Insurance is charged per pay period — a large one-off bonus can pay more NI than this annual view shows.
- No student or postgraduate loan repayment.
- No salary sacrifice and no workplace pension contribution.