Where the UK government's money comes from, where it goes, and how big the gap between the two is. Figures are for the 2025/26 financial year (April 2025 to March 2026), the latest full year of official data.
Every second of the year, on average, the UK public sector…
£43,100
spends
£39,000
raises in tax and other income
£4,100
borrows to cover the gap
Income £1,230bn covers about 90p of every £1 spentBorrowing £130bn
Hover over a slice or row to see its share, and click any row with an arrow to open a more detailed breakdown. Switch to "per person" to see what each figure works out as for every one of the UK's roughly 69.5 million residents.
Where the money comes from
£1,230bn
total income
Where the money goes
£1,360bn
total spending
Year by year
Where the money comes from, 2023/24 to 2025/26
£ billions. Hover a bar for exact figures.
Where the money goes, 2023/24 to 2025/26
£ billions. Hover a bar for exact figures.
Biggest rises since 2023/24
Income
Spending
Figures are in cash terms, not adjusted for inflation (prices rose roughly 8% over these two years). "Other taxes" and "Other & accounting adjustments" are balancing figures, so their year-to-year moves are less meaningful. Earlier-year council tax, business rates, debt interest and non-tax income are estimates.
The big slices, opened up
Three taxes do most of the lifting, and pensions are the single biggest thing the state pays for.
Three taxes raise two-thirds of all tax
Share of the £1,103bn tax take
Inside social protection (£407bn)
Pensions, benefits and social care
Where would your tax go?
Type in roughly how much tax you pay in a year (income tax, National Insurance, VAT, council tax, the lot) and see it split the same way the government splits its whole budget.
£
Every £100 of public spending, one square per pound.
How do you compare?
Type in your total income before tax, from all sources, and see where you sit among the UK's 39.1 million income taxpayers, and how much income tax and National Insurance that means.
£
Percentiles come from HMRC's survey of personal incomes for 2023/24, the latest published, so incomes have risen a little since. Tax is worked out with 2025/26 rates for England, Wales and Northern Ireland; Scotland has its own income tax bands. This covers income tax and employee National Insurance only, not VAT, council tax or other taxes.
Mind the gap
Spending has run ahead of income every year, and the shortfall is borrowed.
Who holds the purse strings
All 24 departmental groups for 2025/26. Departmental budgets (day-to-day plus investment) total £639.8bn; switch to total budgets to add benefits, pensions, student loans and other demand-led spending, which takes the total past £1,260bn.
Click a bar to open that department's breakdown. Departmental totals are official; the split inside each one is an estimate, because the Treasury doesn't publish programme-level detail in this table.
View all the breakdowns as a list
Put another way
Numbers this big are hard to picture, so here they are in smaller pieces.
£300m a day
Interest on the national debt: £109bn a year. That's more than defence, housing and environmental spending put together.
£400m a day
The state pension, at £146bn, is the single biggest item of government spending.
£3,700 each
Health spending of £258bn works out at about £3,700 for every person in the UK.
£19,600
Total public spending per person. Income per person is about £17,700.
36% of GDP
The tax take in 2025/26, the highest share of the economy since the early 1950s.
£42,900
The national debt divided by every person in the UK.
Sources and notes
Totals for 2025/26 (spending £1,360bn, income £1,230bn, tax £1,103bn, borrowing £130bn, debt interest £109bn, income tax, NICs, VAT and corporation tax) come from the OBR Public Finances Databank (August 2026) as reported by the House of Lords Library, "UK fiscal outlook: September 2026".
Spending by function (social protection, health, general public services, education, economic affairs) is from HM Treasury PESA 2026 via the House of Commons Library, "Public spending: a brief introduction" (September 2026). Defence, public order, housing, environment and culture for 2025/26 are estimates from 2024/25 outturn and HM Treasury's reported 2025/26 growth rates; the "other & accounting adjustments" slice reconciles those services to total managed expenditure.
Social protection split uses DWP benefit expenditure and caseload tables (Spring 2026) and the DWP Main Estimate memorandum to Parliament for 2025-26, which budgets PIP at £28.5bn, Attendance Allowance at £8.3bn, Housing Benefit at £11.6bn and Carer's Allowance at £4.5bn. Working-age disability and incapacity benefits together cost about £55bn in 2025/26, per the House of Commons Library. Welfare figures cover Great Britain, so the "social care & other" remainder is approximate. The split of English health spending between day-to-day services, capital and public health is also an estimate.
Council tax (£50bn) and business rates (£30bn) are from the House of Commons Library "Tax statistics: an overview" (June 2026), with England splits from MHCLG collection statistics (June 2026). The PAYE/Self Assessment split of income tax is estimated from HMRC monthly receipts (PAYE income tax and NICs of about £429bn to February 2026, less NICs); the employer/employee NICs split applies the OBR's 2026/27 forecast shares (£153bn employer, £61bn employee) to the 2025/26 total. Alcohol, tobacco, air passenger duty, inheritance tax, green taxes, fuel duty and capital gains tax are from HMRC's annual receipts bulletin (August 2026); insurance premium tax (£9.1bn) from HMRC's annual report and accounts 2025-26; vehicle excise duty from the OBR. Stamp taxes for England and Northern Ireland (£20.0bn incl. shares) are from HMRC; Scottish LBTT is based on reported residential receipts of about £760m plus an estimate for commercial property; Welsh LTT, onshore/offshore corporation tax and the Energy Profits Levy (about £3bn, per the Commons Library) are estimates based on OBR forecasts and 2024/25 outturn. The non-tax income split is an estimate: the Commons Library reports public sector gross operating surplus plus interest and dividends at 4.2% of GDP in 2025/26, and the components are apportioned using typical ONS shares. Spending drill-downs: fuel & energy (£6.6bn) is the HM Treasury 2025/26 figure; transport lines scale the 2024/25 PESA split (railways £26.7bn, national roads £6.5bn, local roads £6.4bn, local public transport £4.7bn, other £2.2bn) to 2025/26; secondary education is based on 2024/25 outturn of £60.6bn. Other spending sub-lines are estimates using typical PESA sub-function shares. Customs duties, apprenticeship levy, betting duties, environmental levies, bank levies and the BBC licence fee are estimates based on 2024/25 receipts and OBR forecasts.
Departmental budgets are total Departmental Expenditure Limits for 2025/26 (resource plus capital), from HM Treasury Public Spending Statistics, July 2026; all 24 groups are shown and they sum to the published £639.8bn. Total budgets including benefits, pensions and other demand-led spending are Total Managed Expenditure by departmental group for 2025/26 from PESA 2025 (table 1.12), which are plans rather than outturn, so the two views come from slightly different vintages. DWP's own accounts put its demand-led spending at £309.5bn in 2025/26, of which £177.2bn went to pensioners and £146.2bn was state pension. The estimated split inside each departmental budget is based on Spending Review 2025 settlements and published programme figures, not an official split; sourced details include the £12.7bn rise for health and £6.4bn for energy in 2025-26, up to £700m more a year for probation and £450m for courts by 2028-29, £2.2bn for Transport for London over 2026-27 to 2029-30, and English councils' expected £77.7bn core spending power in 2026-27.
The percentile calculator uses HMRC percentile points for total income before tax from the Survey of Personal Incomes 2023/24 (published April 2026): median £29,700, top 25% £45,000, top 10% £67,400, top 5% £93,600, top 1% £207,000. Taxpayer numbers are HMRC Income Tax Liabilities Statistics for 2025/26: 39.1 million income tax payers, of whom 7.08 million pay higher rate and 1.23 million additional rate. HMRC also projects the top 1% to be liable for about 27% of all income tax, the top 10% for around 60% and the top half for about 90%. The average income tax bill of £8,400 is total income tax of £329bn divided by 39.1 million taxpayers.
Per-person figures use a population of about 69.5 million. Figures are rounded; slices may not sum exactly.