Data study · HMRC Survey of Personal Incomes 2023-24
The income that puts you in the UK's top 1%, 10% and 25% in 2026
You need a total income of £207,000 a year before tax to be in the top 1% of UK taxpayers, £67,400 for the top 10%, and £45,000 for the top 25%. That is from the latest HMRC data (2023-24 tax year), counts income from every source rather than just salary, and covers taxpayers only.
Top 1% starts at
£207,000
total income before tax
Top 10% starts at
£67,400
roughly 1 in 10 taxpayers
Top 25% starts at
£45,000
the upper quarter
Where does your income rank?
Enter your total annual income before tax, from all sources, to see which slice of UK taxpayers you sit in, nationally and in your region. Nothing leaves your browser.
Use your total income from all sources before tax: pay, self-employment profit, rental income, pensions, interest and dividends. The comparison is against UK income tax payers, not all adults.
You are in the top
~20%
of UK taxpayers by total income, on £50,000 a year. That is about 68% above the median of £29,700.
Latest HMRC data, 2023-24 tax year; typical incomes have grown since. See the take-home on this.
The long tail at the top
Income in the UK is compressed through the middle and explodes at the top. The median taxpayer is on £29,700; the 90th percentile is barely double that; then the last few percentiles each add tens of thousands.
Total income before tax by percentile (UK taxpayers)
The coral bar is the median taxpayer. Notice how compressed everything below the 90th percentile is: the leap from the 98th to the 99th alone (£145,000 to £207,000) is bigger than the whole gap from the median to the 90th.
The thresholds, percentile by percentile
| Percentile | You are in the… | Total income before tax |
|---|---|---|
| 10th | top 90% | £15,700 |
| 20th | top 80% | £19,000 |
| 25th | top 75% | £20,800 |
| 30th | top 70% | £22,500 |
| 40th | top 60% | £25,800 |
| 50th (median) | top 50% | £29,700 |
| 60th | top 40% | £34,500 |
| 70th | top 30% | £40,800 |
| 75th | top 25% | £45,000 |
| 80th | top 20% | £49,900 |
| 90th | top 10% | £67,400 |
| 95th | top 5% | £93,600 |
| 96th | top 4% | £102,000 |
| 97th | top 3% | £118,000 |
| 98th | top 2% | £145,000 |
| 99th | top 1% | £207,000 |
Read it like this: the 90th-percentile income of £67,400 means 90% of taxpayers had a lower total income, putting that person in the top 10%. Source: HMRC Survey of Personal Incomes, tax year 2023-24 (published April 2026), Table 3.1a.
The top 1% by region and nation
The national thresholds hide an enormous regional spread. London's top 1% starts at more than three times the Welsh figure, and the gap widens the further up the distribution you look.
| Region or nation | Median | Top 25% | Top 10% | Top 5% | Top 1% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| North East | £27,500 | £39,700 | £55,700 | £71,000 | £128,000 |
| North West | £28,300 | £41,700 | £59,300 | £77,200 | £149,000 |
| Yorkshire and the Humber | £27,700 | £40,300 | £56,900 | £74,300 | £142,000 |
| East Midlands | £28,400 | £41,600 | £59,100 | £77,600 | £148,000 |
| West Midlands | £28,300 | £41,700 | £59,100 | £77,600 | £150,000 |
| East of England | £30,900 | £47,600 | £72,900 | £100,000 | £226,000 |
| London | £35,700 | £56,900 | £98,200 | £149,000 | £419,000 |
| South East | £32,300 | £50,100 | £80,000 | £111,000 | £257,000 |
| South West | £29,100 | £43,000 | £61,800 | £83,000 | £164,000 |
| Wales | £27,700 | £40,200 | £55,500 | £69,600 | £126,000 |
| Scotland | £29,600 | £43,400 | £61,600 | £81,800 | £153,000 |
| Northern Ireland | £27,700 | £39,400 | £54,000 | £70,300 | £133,000 |
Total income before tax of taxpayers resident in each area. Source: HMRC Survey of Personal Incomes, tax year 2023-24 (published April 2026), Table 3.14 percentile points (region and nation rows). HMRC advises treating sub-UK estimates with particular caution.
Total income is not the same as salary
This study measures total income of all taxpayers: employment pay plus self-employment profits, rental income, pensions, interest and dividends, as reported to HMRC. Our average UK salary study measures something narrower: the gross pay of full-time employees from the ONS earnings survey. The two distributions disagree, and both are right.
The taxpayer median here (£29,700) sits well below the full-time salary median (£39,039) because this population includes pensioners and part-time workers, who rarely appear in full-time salary statistics. At the top end the opposite happens: business profits, property and investment income are concentrated among high earners, so the top tail here stretches far beyond anything in the salary data. If you want "how does my pay compare with other employees", use the salary study; if you want "where does my whole income put me among people who pay tax", this is the right page.
Methodology and sources
All figures come from the HMRC Survey of Personal Incomes, tax year 2023-24 (published April 2026), HMRC's annual sample of income tax records. National percentile points are from Table 3.1a (percentile points from 1 to 99 for total income before tax); regional figures are from the region and nation rows of Table 3.14's percentile points. Both tables were retrieved from gov.uk and verified on 12 June 2026.
The figures are total income assessable for tax, before income tax is deducted, for the 2023-24 tax year. They cover taxpayers only, about 36.7 million people. Adults whose income fell below the personal allowance are excluded, which raises every threshold compared with a population-wide measure. 2023-24 is the latest year HMRC has published; incomes have grown since, so current thresholds will be somewhat higher. We quote the published figures unchanged rather than applying our own uplift.
The interactive rank uses linear interpolation between HMRC's published percentile points and is clamped to the published range, so it never claims a finer rank than the top or bottom 1%. We refresh this page when HMRC publishes the next SPI year, usually each spring.
Common questions
- What income puts you in the top 1% of the UK?
- A total income of £207,000 a year before tax puts you in the top 1% of UK taxpayers (HMRC Survey of Personal Incomes, tax year 2023-24 (published April 2026)). That is income from all sources combined: pay, self-employment, property, pensions, interest and dividends. The threshold varies hugely by region: in London the top 1% starts at £419,000, while in Wales it starts at £126,000.
- What income puts you in the top 10% of the UK?
- £67,400 of total income before tax puts you in the top 10% of UK taxpayers, and £93,600 reaches the top 5% (HMRC, 2023-24 tax year). Because these figures cover taxpayers only and incomes have grown since 2023-24, treat them as a slightly conservative floor.
- Is £100,000 a top 5% income in the UK?
- Yes. The top 5% of UK taxpayers starts at £93,600 of total income before tax, so £100,000 sits inside it, at roughly the top 4% nationally. In London the picture is different: the capital's top 5% starts at £149,000, so £100,000 there is closer to the top 10%.
- Why are these thresholds different from salary percentile figures?
- Two different datasets. Salary percentiles (like our average UK salary study) come from the ONS earnings survey and cover employees' pay only, usually full-time employees. This study uses HMRC's Survey of Personal Incomes, which counts each taxpayer's total income from every source and includes pensioners, landlords, the self-employed and part-time workers. That mix pulls the middle of this distribution lower (median £29,700 versus a full-time salary median around £39,039), while investment and business income fattens the top tail.
- Does this data cover everyone in the UK?
- No. It covers the 36.7 million people who paid income tax in 2023-24. Millions of adults with incomes below the personal allowance are not counted at all, so against the whole adult population each threshold would sit at an even lower percentile. In other words, if you clear the top 10% bar here, you are comfortably inside the top 10% of all UK adults.
- How current are these figures?
- The 2023-24 tax year is the latest covered by HMRC's Survey of Personal Incomes; the figures were published in April 2026. Wages and other incomes have grown since 2023-24, so today's true thresholds are somewhat higher than the published ones. We show the published numbers rather than guessing at uprated ones, and we refresh this page when HMRC releases the next SPI year.
See what a top income keeps after tax
Crossing these thresholds changes your tax picture: the 60% effective band above £100,000, the additional rate at £125,140, dividend rates on investment income. The gross figure is only the start.