Key takeaways
- The main rates for 2027/28 are published unchanged: personal allowance £12,570, basic rate 20%, higher rate 40%, additional rate 45%, employee National Insurance 8% to £50,270 then 2%.
- From April 2027, savings rates rise to 24% / 44% / 49%, and a new set of property rates at 24% / 44% / 49% applies.
- The trading allowance triples, from £1,000 to £3,000 — £3,000 of gross trading income a year tax-free, with no return needed at all below that line.
- The personal allowance stays at £12,570, the higher-rate threshold stays at £50,270, and the £100,000 taper threshold does not move — when wages rise and thresholds do not, more of your pay is taxed.
The headline for 2027/28 is how little changes: the main rates — personal allowance, income tax bands, National Insurance and employer NI — are all unchanged. The changes that do come are in savings, property and the trading allowance.
DRAFT — not for publication until February 2027. This article is written ahead of the new tax year from the rates published in Budget 2026. It must be re-checked against GOV.UK at the next fiscal event before it goes live: if anything changes, this draft changes with it.
Every April brings a new tax year, and every February brings the same question: what actually changes on 6 April? For 2027/28 the answer, as published in Budget 2026, is refreshingly dull at the top and quietly significant underneath. The rates that affect most people's payslips do not move at all. The changes land on savers, landlords and the smallest traders instead.
What stays the same
The main rates for 2027/28 are published unchanged: personal allowance £12,570, basic rate 20% on taxable income up to £37,700, higher rate 40% to £125,140, additional rate 45% above that, employee National Insurance 8% to £50,270 then 2%, employer National Insurance 15%, and the Employment Allowance at £10,500. Dividend rates (10.75% / 35.75% / 39.35% with the £500 allowance), Class 4 National Insurance (6% / 2%) and corporation tax (19% / 25%) are unchanged too. If your only income is a salary, your payslip on 6 April 2027 will look the same as the one before it — apart from the usual April upratings to the minimum wage, which are announced separately.
That stability is itself the story. Personal allowance freezes and band freezes are a stealth tax rise when wages grow — the same £12,570 shelters a smaller share of a rising salary each year — but for 2027/28 there is no new threshold to learn and no new band to fall into. Use the take-home pay calculator with the 2027/28 rates when they are confirmed, and the figure will match 2026/27 to the penny for most salaries.
What changes: savings and property
The change that matters most is the one most people have not heard of: from April 2027, savings rates rise to 24% / 44% / 49%, and a new set of property rates at 24% / 44% / 49% applies. If you earn interest on savings above your personal savings allowance, or income from property, the rate on that income jumps — in the basic-rate band, from 20% to 24%. That is a significant rise, and it is the deliberate policy choice of Budget 2026: earned income held steady, unearned income taxed harder. If you have savings income, check whether your personal savings allowance (£1,000 for basic-rate taxpayers, £500 for higher-rate) still shelters it, and whether moving money into an ISA — where the interest is tax-free — is worth doing before April.
What changes: the small numbers
Three smaller changes are worth knowing. The Lower Earnings Limit rises from £129 to £133 a week, which moves the earnings floor for Statutory Maternity Pay and the starting point for National Insurance records. The Class 2 small-profits threshold rises from £7,105 to £7,355 (voluntary Class 2 from £3.65 to £3.80 a week), which matters to the lowest-earning self-employed. And the trading allowance triples, from £1,000 to £3,000 — the biggest practical win in the whole Budget for side hustles: £3,000 of gross trading income a year tax-free, with no return needed at all below that line. If you sell, freelance or trade on the side, that change alone is worth more than any payslip movement.
The stealth tax nobody announces
The most important 2027/28 change is the one that is not a change at all: the freeze. The personal allowance stays at £12,570, the higher-rate threshold stays at £50,270, and the £100,000 taper threshold does not move either. When wages rise and thresholds do not, more of your pay is taxed, and more of it is taxed at higher rates — without any minister announcing a tax rise. This is fiscal drag, and it has been the single biggest driver of tax bills for several years now. A 3% pay rise on a £35,000 salary is £1,050 more gross pay, and almost all of it is taxed at 20% plus 8% NI, because the allowance does not grow with it. Over five years of freezes, the effect compounds: the same real salary pays materially more tax than it did when the freeze began.
The freeze is also why the "unchanged" headline is misleading for anyone near a threshold. If your salary is £49,000, a normal pay rise takes you over £50,270 and into the 40% band — not because the band moved, but because you did. If your salary is £98,000, a rise takes you into the taper zone, where the effective rate is 60%. The 2027/28 rates do not create these cliffs; they preserve them, and wage growth pushes more people over them every year. The practical response is the same as ever: know which threshold you are near, and run the numbers before you agree a rise. The take-home pay calculator shows your marginal rate at any salary, and the £100,000 tax trap guide explains the taper in full.
What to do in February
February is when this article publishes, and it is the right month to act. Tax-year-end planning rewards the early: pension contributions made before 5 April count against this year's allowance, and salary-sacrifice arrangements take a payroll cycle or two to set up. If you are near £100,000, February is the month to check whether a pension contribution can pull you back under the taper threshold — the saving is the 60% effective rate on the slice you shelter, which is the best return available anywhere in the tax system. If you have savings income, February is the month to check your ISA allowance: money moved into an ISA before April earns interest tax-free under the new 24% savings rate, and the allowance does not carry over. And if you trade on the side, February is the month to plan for the £3,000 trading allowance: from April, £3,000 of gross trading income is tax-free, so a side hustle that earns under that line needs no return at all.
The dates that matter in 2027/28
A few dates to put in the diary now. 6 April 2027 is the start of the new tax year — the day the savings and property rates change, the LEL rises to £133 a week, the Class 2 threshold rises to £7,355, and the trading allowance rises to £3,000. 5 April 2028 is the last day of the year. 31 January 2028 is the self-assessment deadline for the 2027/28 year, and the same day the first payment on account falls due. And 5 April 2027 is the last day to use this year's ISA allowance — money not moved by then loses the allowance for good. None of these dates is dramatic on its own, but together they are the calendar of the tax year, and the people who pay the least tax are usually the ones who knew the dates in advance.
What to do before 6 April
Three jobs. First, check your tax code: a new tax year is when HMRC issues new codes, and a wrong code in April costs you for months — see our guide to 1257L and when your tax code is wrong. Second, if you have savings income or property income, work out what the new 24% / 44% / 49% rates mean for you before April, not after. Third, if you are self-employed, remember the trading allowance change and the Class 2 threshold change when you do your 2027/28 planning — and that your 2026/27 return is still due by 31 January 2028 under the old rules. The full preview is on UK tax rates 2027/28.
When April arrives, run the April checklist: 7 payslip things to check in the new tax year — tax code, minimum wage, allowance, National Insurance, student loan, pension and rates, in ten minutes.
The one thing to remember about 2027/28 is the sentence that matters most: the main rates do not change. The personal allowance stays at £12,570, the bands stay at 20%, 40% and 45%, and National Insurance stays at 8% and 2%. What changes is everything around the edges — savings and property rates up to 24%, 44% and 49%, the lower earnings limit up to £133 a week, the Class 2 threshold up to £7,355, the trading allowance up to £3,000. For most employees, the April payslip will look almost identical to March's, and that is the point: the tax year that changes nothing for most people is still the tax year to check, because the freeze is doing its quiet work in the background, and the thresholds you were near last year are the thresholds you will cross this year.
Check your 2027/28 take-home
Use the take-home pay calculator with the 2027/28 rates when they are confirmed — for most salaries the figure will match 2026/27 to the penny.
DRAFT — figures from Budget 2026 OOTLAR Annex A, last checked against GOV.UK on 5 November 2026. Re-check at the next fiscal event before publishing. See the live rates on UK tax rates 2026/27.