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Life insurance needs calculator
How much cover your family would actually need, built from your mortgage, debts, income and children, minus what you already have. No quotes, no products, no sales call.
A common rule of thumb for the years: until your youngest child turns 21, or until your partner could comfortably manage on one income.
The funeral default of £4,500sits between a simple attended funeral (£3,828) and a traditional one (£4,510) in SunLife’s 2026 Cost of Dying report; edit it to taste. Death-in-service from work counts as existing cover, often 2 to 4 times salary.
Cover your family would roughly need
£700,000
Suggested term: about 20 years (the longer of your mortgage and the income-replacement years)
- Outstanding mortgage
- £150,000
- Other debts
- £5,000
- Income replacement (£30,000 × 18)
- £540,000
- Funeral costs
- £4,500
- Rounded up to the nearest £10,000
- £700,000
A guide, not advice or a quote. Cover that mainly clears a repayment mortgage can be decreasing-term, which is cheaper; see how the balance falls in the mortgage repayment calculator. If illness rather than death is the bigger worry, read the income protection guide.
Common questions
- How much life insurance do I need?
- Add up what your family would have to fund without you: the mortgage, other debts, the income they would need replaced (a common yardstick is until your youngest child turns 21), any education lump sums, and a funeral. Then subtract life cover you already have, including death-in-service from work, and savings they could draw on. The remainder is the gap worth insuring. For many families it lands between £200,000 and £600,000, far more than the default 2 to 4 times salary from work alone.
- Should I choose level or decreasing term cover?
- Level term pays the same amount whenever you die during the term; decreasing term shrinks over time and is designed to track a repayment mortgage, so it is noticeably cheaper. If most of your need is the mortgage, decreasing term fits well. If most of it is income replacement for young children, level term keeps the payout meaningful in year 15, not just year 1. Many people mix the two.
- Do I need life insurance if I have no dependants?
- Usually not, and an honest calculator should say so. Life insurance exists to replace your financial contribution to people who rely on it. With no partner or children depending on your income, and no joint debts, there is little to insure: most unsecured debts die with you rather than passing to family. A funeral is the one cost left behind, and savings often cover that.
- Is a joint policy or two single policies better for couples?
- A joint policy covers two people but pays out once, usually on the first death, then ends, leaving the survivor uninsured and older when they shop again. Two single policies cost a little more but pay out twice if both die during the term, and each policy survives a separation. For most couples with children, two single policies are worth the small extra cost.
- Should I write my life insurance in trust?
- Often, yes. A policy written in trust pays directly to your chosen beneficiaries instead of joining your estate, which means no waiting for probate (payouts in weeks rather than months) and the money normally sits outside your estate for inheritance tax. Most insurers offer trust forms for free when you take the policy out. It is a legal arrangement, so check the details fit your situation, especially with stepchildren or previous marriages.
- What is the difference between life insurance and income protection?
- Life insurance pays a lump sum if you die. Income protection pays a monthly income if you are too ill or injured to work, which is statistically far more likely during a working life. They solve different problems and many households need both: life cover for the mortgage and the children, income protection because Statutory Sick Pay is £123.25 a week and most illnesses do not kill you, they just stop you earning.
Life cover handles the worst case; the far more common one is being too ill to work. The income protection guide covers that gap. And if decreasing-term cover for the mortgage is on your mind, the mortgage repayment calculator shows exactly how fast the balance falls.