Child Benefit calculator
The tax charge nobody explains properly.
Earn over £60,000 and the taxman starts taking your Child Benefit back. See what you actually keep, the real tax rate hiding in that band, and the one move that hands the whole lot back to you.
Your numbers
One person’s income, not the household’s - and it’s your taxable income after pension contributions come off, which is the whole trick here.
£27.05 a week for the eldest, then £17.90 a week each after that.
Scottish taxpayers: the charge itself works the same way, but the tax rates underneath it differ, so the marginal rate and the cost of the pension move below will be a little different for you.
Of £2,337 a year, you keep
On £70,000 of adjusted net income with 2 children, your full Child Benefit is £2,337 a year. The High Income Child Benefit Charge takes £1,169, leaving you £1,169. Your effective marginal tax rate in this band is 53.7%.
£1,169
£1,169
The charge is 50.0% of your Child Benefit, and it climbs with every pound you earn over £60,000.
Your real tax rate on the next pound
That’s 42% of tax and National Insurance, plus the Child Benefit being taken back. A £1,000 pay rise leaves you about £463 better off.
| £000s of income above £60,000 | Child Benefit kept | Full Child Benefit |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | £2,337 | £2,337 |
| 1 | £2,221 | £2,337 |
| 2 | £2,104 | £2,337 |
| 3 | £1,987 | £2,337 |
| 4 | £1,870 | £2,337 |
| 5 | £1,753 | £2,337 |
| 6 | £1,636 | £2,337 |
| 7 | £1,519 | £2,337 |
| 8 | £1,402 | £2,337 |
| 9 | £1,286 | £2,337 |
| 10 | £1,169 | £2,337 |
| 11 | £1,052 | £2,337 |
| 12 | £935 | £2,337 |
| 13 | £818 | £2,337 |
| 14 | £701 | £2,337 |
| 15 | £584 | £2,337 |
| 16 | £467 | £2,337 |
| 17 | £351 | £2,337 |
| 18 | £234 | £2,337 |
| 19 | £117 | £2,337 |
| 20 | £0 | £2,337 |
The move
Put £10,000 into your pension and keep every penny of it.
Pension contributions come off your adjusted net income before the charge is worked out. Contributing your way back down to £60,000 wipes the charge out completely - and you were going to lose most of that money to tax anyway.
£5,800
£1,169
£4,631
£10,000 lands in your pension for £4,631 out of your pocket. That is 2.16 pounds of pension for every pound it actually costs you.
Salary sacrifice is the cleanest way to do it - the money never counts as your income, so the National Insurance saving is automatic. A personal pension contribution gets to the same place, but you claim the higher-rate part back through your tax return. Either way, check you have the pension annual allowance to spare and that sacrificing does not drop your pay below minimum wage.
Five things people get wrong
- Claim it even if you will pay every penny back. Claiming registers you for National Insurance credits towards your State Pension until your youngest turns 12, and gets your child their National Insurance number automatically. You can tick the box to claim without receiving the payments, so there is nothing to hand back.
- It is one person's income, not the household's. The charge falls on whoever has the higher adjusted net income. Two parents on £55,000 each pay nothing; one parent on £85,000 with a partner earning nothing loses the lot.
- Adjusted net income is not your salary. It is your taxable income before the personal allowance, after pension contributions and Gift Aid come off. That is the whole reason the pension move above works.
- You do not have to go all the way. Any pension contribution shrinks the charge in proportion, even one that leaves you inside the band. Salary sacrifice is the tidiest route because the money never counts as your income at all.
- Check how you are meant to pay it. The charge has historically meant a Self Assessment return. HMRC now lets some people pay it through their tax code instead, so check gov.uk for what applies to you before you assume you need to file.
Start with your own figures on gov.uk - this tool shows you the shape of the thing, not your tax return.
How this works
Child Benefit is £27.05 (2026 to 2027 tax year) a week for the eldest child and £17.90 (2026 to 2027 tax year) a week for each other child. The High Income Child Benefit Charge takes 1% of it for every £200 of adjusted net income above £60,000 (from 6 April 2024; unchanged for the 2026 to 2027 tax year), so it reaches the full amount at £80,000 (from 6 April 2024; unchanged for the 2026 to 2027 tax year). The marginal rate adds that clawback to 42% (2026 to 2027 tax year).
HMRC works the charge out in whole percentage points, so a real bill can land a few pounds under the figure here. This assumes employment income taxed at England, Wales and Northern Ireland rates, and stops at £100,000 - above that the personal allowance starts being withdrawn too, which is a different problem. Student loan repayments, dividends and savings income are not modelled. This is not financial advice. These are ideas to make you a little bit richer.
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