Judicial Salaries 2026/27: Every Group and Take-Home Pay
UK judicial salaries from 1 April 2026 - all eleven groups after the 3.5% award (3.8% recommended), with take-home after tax, NI and the judicial pension.
What was awarded, and what was asked for
Judicial pay is recommended by the Senior Salaries Review Body and set by the Lord Chancellor. For 2026/27 the two parted company, and both halves are on the public record.
- 3.8% recommended. The review body's 2026 report says it plainly: "We recommend that all salaried judicial office holders should receive a 3.8 per cent consolidated increase to base pay from 1 April 2026."
- 3.5% implemented from 1 April 2026, published on 7 August 2026. That figure is not a claim we are taking on trust: every one of the eleven groups is exactly its 2025/26 salary uplifted by 3.5% and rounded to the nearest pound.
- It is in force. The schedule effective 1 April 2026 is the operative document, not a proposal. That is worth saying because it is not true everywhere this year: council staff on the NJC pay spine are still being paid April 2025 rates while their 2026/27 offer sits rejected.
Every salary group, and what it nets
Take-home assumes England, 2026/27 tax rules, and membership of the Judicial Pension Scheme 2022 at the uniform 4.26% contribution. Because that scheme gives no tax relief, the contribution is taken from pay that has already been taxed.
| Group | Example post | 2025/26 | 2026/27 | Take-home | Per month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lady Chief Justice | £325,010 | £336,385 | £175,740 | £14,645 |
| 1.1 | President of the Supreme Court | £290,213 | £300,370 | £158,187 | £13,182 |
| 2 | Justices of the Supreme Court | £280,311 | £290,122 | £153,192 | £12,766 |
| 3 | Lords and Lady Justices of Appeal | £266,556 | £275,885 | £146,253 | £12,188 |
| 4 | Puisne Judge of the High Court | £234,096 | £242,289 | £129,878 | £10,823 |
| 5 | Senior Circuit Judge | £187,743 | £194,314 | £106,495 | £8,875 |
| 5.1 | Upper Tribunal Judge | £180,810 | £187,138 | £102,997 | £8,583 |
| 5.2 | Circuit Judge | £173,854 | £179,939 | £99,489 | £8,291 |
| 6 | Vice-Judge Advocate General | £163,675 | £169,404 | £94,354 | £7,863 |
| 7 | District Judge | £139,469 | £144,350 | £82,143 | £6,845 |
| 8 | Salaried (Regional) Medical Members, Social Entitlement Chamber | £110,826 | £114,705 | £69,259 | £5,772 |
Basic salary only, for a full-time office holder under State Pension age. Excludes the London salary lead and allowance for group 7, the 4% allowance certain leadership roles attract, and any fees. Salaried part-time office holders are paid pro rata. Judges resident in Scotland pay Scottish Income Tax on the same gross.
If you are over State Pension age, add the National Insurance back
This matters more here than on most pay pages. The judicial retirement age is 75, while State Pension age is 66, rising in monthly steps for people born between 6 April 1960 and 5 March 1961 and reaching 67 for anyone born on or after 6 March 1961 (Pensions Act 2014 s.26), so a substantial part of the salaried judiciary pays no employee National Insurance at all. Take-home for them is higher by the whole NI line: a District Judge nets £87,040 rather than £82,143, and the Lady Chief Justice £184,479 rather than £175,740. Employer National Insurance is still due either way.
The pension almost nobody models correctly
There are three ways an occupational pension contribution can be treated for tax, and the judicial scheme is the rarest of them.
- Salary sacrifice reduces your gross pay, so it saves both Income Tax and National Insurance.
- A net pay arrangement takes the contribution before Income Tax but not before National Insurance. This is how the NHS, Teachers', Local Government, Civil Service alpha, police and firefighters' schemes all work.
- A tax-unregistered scheme gives no relief at all. The Judicial Pension Scheme 2022 guide is explicit: "As JPS 2022 is a tax-unregistered scheme, your contributions will not receive any tax relief."
So a judge pays Income Tax and National Insurance on the whole salary, and the 4.26% comes out of what is left. The difference is not small. Treating a District Judge's contribution as if it attracted relief the way an NHS one does would overstate take-home by about £2,767 a year, and for group 8 - which sits in the 60% band - by about £2,932.
There is a second consequence that is easy to miss. Because the contribution does not reduce taxable pay, it does not reduce adjusted net income either. Anything that is assessed on adjusted net income - the personal allowance taper above £100,000, the High Income Child Benefit Charge - therefore bites on the full salary, where a contribution to a relieved scheme would have brought the figure down first.
That is not the whole story, and it would be misleading to leave it there. Being outside the registered-scheme regime cuts both ways: the same scheme guide notes that JPS 2022 is "not included in any tax limits on pensions, for example lifetime allowance or annual allowance". For judges on these salaries that matters, because a registered scheme would expose many of them to a tapered annual allowance and the charges that come with it. The regulations also provide a supplement on commutation that is expressly calculated to cover the Income Tax and National Insurance a member pays on the lump sum. Whether the trade is good or bad depends on the individual; what it is not is a simple loss.
One rate applies to everyone in the scheme, so there is no banding to check. A time-limited 3% option existed for judges in post when the scheme started, in exchange for a lower accrual rate, but it ran only to 31 March 2025 and those members moved automatically to the uniform rate.
Why the tax bill looks so heavy
10 of the eleven groups are paid more than £125,140, the point at which the personal allowance has been withdrawn in full. For those judges there is no tax-free band at all, and everything above £125,140 is taxed at the additional rate.
Group 8, at £114,705, is the interesting case. It is the lowest-paid judicial group and it faces the highest marginal rate on the page: it sits inside the £100,000 to £125,140 band, where £1 of personal allowance is lost for every £2 of income, producing an effective 60% marginal rate. With the 2% National Insurance that still applies above the upper earnings limit, the marginal deduction is 62%, so a pay rise there is worth about 38p in the pound before the pension contribution.
Read our £100,000 tax trap guide for how that band works, and the salary calculator if you want to model a different figure.
The posts still on last year's money
The schedule is not uniform. Seven Northern Ireland posts carry a footnote reading "Awaiting uplift pending decision on 2026/27 pay award", and the figures printed against them are still the 2025/26 amounts. If you are in one of these posts, the number in the 2026/27 schedule is not a 2026/27 rate.
| Post | Group | Shown as | Group rate 2026/27 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Surveyor Member, Lands Tribunal (Northern Ireland) | 5.1 | £180,810 | £187,138 |
| President, Appeal Tribunals (Northern Ireland) | 5.2 | £173,854 | £179,939 |
| President, Industrial Tribunals and Fair Employment Tribunal (Northern Ireland) | 5.2 | £173,854 | £179,939 |
| President, Lands Tribunal (Northern Ireland) Footnote v: the office sits in group 5.2 and the post is currently held by a High Court Judge. This is the office rate; the schedule does not say what the current holder is paid. | 5.2 | £173,854 | £179,939 |
| Vice-President, Industrial Tribunals and Fair Employment Tribunal (Northern Ireland) | 6 | £163,675 | £169,404 |
| Employment Judge (Northern Ireland) | 7 | £139,469 | £144,350 |
| Full-time Salaried Legal Member of the Appeal Tribunals (Chair) (Northern Ireland) | 7 | £139,469 | £144,350 |
Salaries for devolved posts are the responsibility of the respective devolved governments, which is why a Northern Ireland award can run on a different timetable from the one applied in England and Wales.
What the group rate leaves out
- London, for group 7. Post-holders in London receive an additional £2,000 salary lead and an additional £2,000 London allowance, so a London District Judge is on £146,350 of salary plus the allowance.
- Leadership allowances. Within group 5.2, a Designated Civil Judge, Designated Family Judge or Resident Judge carries an allowance of 4% of salary while performing the role, introduced in October 2020. The schedule attaches the same allowance to the Presiding Master of the Court of Judicature (Northern Ireland), also in group 5.2, and to the Presiding District Judge (Northern Ireland) in group 7. The three titles also appear in group 5, where the schedule marks no allowance.
- Individual arrangements. A few posts sit outside their group's rate entirely. The schedule lists the Recorder of Belfast at the group 5 rate, with a footnote recording that the current post-holder receives 108% of it.
- Fee-paid work. This page covers salaried office holders. Fee-paid judges are paid daily rates under a separate published schedule.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a District Judge earn in 2026/27?
£144,350, salary group 7, from 1 April 2026. After Income Tax, National Insurance and the 4.26% judicial pension contribution that is about £82,143 a year, or £6,845 a month. District Judges sitting in London also receive a £2,000 salary lead and a £2,000 London allowance on top.
How much does a Circuit Judge earn?
£179,939, salary group 5.2. A Senior Circuit Judge is in group 5 at £194,314, and a High Court judge in group 4 at £242,289.
What pay rise did judges get in 2026/27?
3.5%, applied to every salary group from 1 April 2026. The Senior Salaries Review Body had recommended 3.8%, so the award landed 0.3 percentage points below the recommendation. Unlike several other public sector pay rounds this year, it is implemented rather than pending.
Do judges get tax relief on their pension contributions?
No, and this is the unusual part. The Judicial Pension Scheme 2022 is tax-unregistered, and its own scheme guide says contributions "will not receive any tax relief". So the 4.26% comes out of already-taxed pay: Income Tax and National Insurance are charged on the full salary first. Every other large public service scheme - NHS, Teachers', LGPS, Civil Service alpha - is a net pay arrangement that does give relief, which is why a general calculator will overstate a judge's take-home.
Why do judges pay so much tax?
Because 10 of the eleven salary groups sit above £125,140, where the personal allowance has been withdrawn completely, so the whole £12,570 allowance is gone and income above £125,140 is taxed at the additional rate. Group 8, at £114,705, is the exception and is arguably worse off at the margin: it sits inside the £100,000 to £125,140 band where losing £1 of allowance for every £2 earned produces an effective 60% marginal rate.
Are all judicial salaries increasing this year?
Not all of them. Seven Northern Ireland posts carry a footnote reading "Awaiting uplift pending decision on 2026/27 pay award", and their published figures are still the 2025/26 amounts. An Employment Judge in Northern Ireland, for instance, is shown at £139,469 where the England and Wales equivalent is £144,350.