Where your income ranks in the UK
The UK top 1% of taxpayers starts at £207,000 of total income, the top 5% at £93,600 and the top 10% at £67,400. HMRC 2023/24, with ONS earnings alongside.
What it takes to be in the top
Among people with some Income Tax liability in 2023/24:
| Group | Total income before tax, from |
|---|---|
| Top 1% | £207,000 |
| Top 2% | £145,000 |
| Top 5% | £93,600 |
| Top 10% | £67,400 |
| Top 25% | £45,000 |
| Top half | £29,700 |
Total income means everything the tax system sees added together: salary, pension income, rental profits, dividends, self-employed profits, savings interest. Somebody on a £80,000 salary with £15,000 of rental profit is measured at £95,000 here, not £80,000.
The full taxpayer distribution
HMRC's published percentile points for 2023/24, in full. Read a row as "this share of taxpayers has total income at or below this figure".
| Percentile | Total income before tax | |
|---|---|---|
| 1th | £12,800 | |
| 5th | £14,100 | |
| 10th | £15,700 | |
| 20th | £19,000 | |
| 25th | £20,800 | |
| 30th | £22,500 | |
| 40th | £25,800 | |
| 50th | £29,700 | Median taxpayer |
| 60th | £34,500 | |
| 70th | £40,800 | |
| 75th | £45,000 | |
| 80th | £49,900 | |
| 90th | £67,400 | |
| 95th | £93,600 | |
| 98th | £145,000 | |
| 99th | £207,000 | Top 1% starts here |
Salaries, as a separate question
If what you want to know is how your salary compares with other people's salaries, the taxpayer table is the wrong instrument. ONS ASHE measures the gross annual earnings of full-time employees, which is a narrower and better-paid group.
| Percentile | Full-time gross annual pay |
|---|---|
| 10th | £23,990 |
| 25th | £29,262 |
| 50th | £39,039 |
| 75th | £54,009 |
| 90th | £76,903 |
ASHE publishes these five breakpoints and stops at the 90th percentile, which is why the top-1% question can only be answered from the taxpayer series. The median full-time salary is £39,039 on the 2025 release.
Reading these numbers honestly
Three things to keep in mind before reading too much into a percentile figure.
- Taxpayers only. HMRC's note is explicit that the table "is based on UK taxpayers only". Everyone below the Personal Allowance is excluded, so every percentile here sits above the equivalent figure for all UK adults.
- Individuals, not households. Both series measure one person. A household with two incomes of £40,000 is nowhere near the top decile on these tables, while a single earner on £80,000 is - although the two households have the same money coming in, and rather different tax bills.
- Before tax, and before housing. These are gross figures. What an income feels like depends on the marginal rate it meets and on what a roof costs where it is earned - see the cost-of-living comparison and the regional salary heatmap.
To see what any of these figures is actually worth after Income Tax and National Insurance, put it through the salary calculator, or the National Insurance calculator for the contributions alone.
Frequently asked questions
What salary puts you in the top 1% in the UK?
£207,000 of total income before tax, on HMRC's 2023/24 figures. That is total income - salary, pensions, rental profits, dividends, self-employed profits and savings interest added together - among people who have some Income Tax liability. A salary alone of that size would put you there, but so would a smaller salary alongside substantial investment or rental income.
What income is the top 10% in the UK?
£67,400 of total income puts a UK taxpayer in the top 10%, and £93,600 in the top 5% (HMRC, 2023/24). On the separate ONS measure of full-time employee earnings, the 90th percentile salary is £76,903 - higher, because that series counts only full-time employees, while the taxpayer population also includes part-time workers and people whose income is a pension or an investment return.
Why do the two sets of figures disagree?
They measure different people and different money. ONS ASHE measures the gross earnings of full-time employees; HMRC's Survey of Personal Incomes measures the total income of everyone with an Income Tax liability. The taxpayer population also includes part-time workers, pensioners and people living on investment income, and the middle of that distribution sits lower - the taxpayer median is £29,700 against a full-time employee median of £39,039. Neither is wrong; they answer different questions.
Does this include people who pay no Income Tax?
The HMRC series does not. Its own note says the table "is based on UK taxpayers only", so anyone whose income falls below the Personal Allowance is outside it entirely. That matters: every percentile here is higher than the equivalent figure for the whole adult population would be. If you are comparing yourself against "everyone in the UK", these figures overstate where you sit.
Why is there no figure for the top 0.1%?
Because the published table stops at the 99th percentile, and this site does not extrapolate past its sources. The tail of the income distribution is long and its shape is not described by any of the points in this dataset, so any figure quoted for the top 0.1% here would be invented rather than measured.
How current are these figures?
The HMRC percentile points are for 2023/24, published in April 2026 - the Survey of Personal Incomes runs several years behind because it is built from filed tax records. The ONS earnings figures are from the 2025 ASHE release. Both are the most recent published, and both describe a past year rather than today, which is worth holding onto when comparing them with a current salary.