Personal Savings Allowance Calculator

Our Personal Savings Allowance (PSA) calculator is designed to help you check if you’ve gone over your PSA.

We’ll use a couple of details about your savings to make an estimate. As part of our calculations, we’ll apply the following assumptions:

• It applies a savings starting rate of £5,000 for those on a low income
• It uses a standard personal tax allowance of £12,570
• Where income is over the £100,000 limit, the personal income tax allowance of £12,570 is reduced by £1 for every £2 earned
• Where income is £125,140 or above, the Personal Savings Allowance is zero
• Your result assumes that interest is accessible and/or is received within the current tax year

Your Personal Savings Allowance (PSA) is the amount of tax-free interest you can earn in each tax year. The tax year runs from 6 April in one year to 5 April in the next.

Your PSA depends on which income tax band you’re in:

• Basic-rate taxpayers (20%) can earn £1,000 tax-free
• Higher-rate taxpayers (40%) can earn £500 tax-free
• Additional-rate taxpayers (45%) don’t get an allowance

Your PSA applies to interest earned from the following:

• Bank and building society accounts
• Savings and credit union accounts
• Unit trusts, investment trusts and open-ended investment companies
• Peer-to-peer lending
• Trust funds
• Payment Protection Insurance (PPI)
• Government or company bonds
• Life annuity payments
• Some life insurance contracts

Interest from money held in a Cash ISA doesn’t count towards your PSA.

That’s because Cash ISAs are a special type of savings account where you can earn interest tax-free.

Currently, the ISA allowance is £20,000. You split this between different types of ISA accounts, including Cash ISAs, Stocks and Shares ISAs and Lifetime ISAs.

It’s worth noting that some National Savings and Investments (NS&I) accounts don’t count towards your allowance either.

Potentially! You might need to pay tax on your savings in the UK if you go over your PSA.

If you go over your PSA, HMRC usually collects the tax automatically by changing your tax code. However, in some cases, you’ll need to pay using a self-assessment tax return instead.

If you have a joint savings account, the interest earned is split equally between each account holder.

For example, if a couple earns £1,000 in interest from a joint savings account, each person receives £500 in interest.

Couples that are married or in a civil partnership can apply to HMRC to change the split of the interest.

For instance, if one partner has a higher PSA it might be financially beneficial to give them a larger share of the interest split to keep it tax-free.

You might be able to reclaim tax back if you’ve paid too much.

To do this you’ll need to contact HMRC within 4 years of the end of the tax year you overpaid.

You can submit it as part of a self-assessment tax return if you fill one out. Or, you can make a claim on GOV.UK.

This calculator is for illustrative purposes only and is intended to give you an estimate of any tax you might have to pay based on the information you provide.

Tax treatment is subject to individual circumstances. Any reference to taxes, reliefs or rates is based on the rules in place as at 06/04/2025 and is subject to change.