Salary Sacrifice Calculator
See the real net cost of sacrificing salary into your pension — you save income tax AND employee National Insurance, not just tax. Compare it against a standard personal contribution and see exactly what £1 of pension really costs you.
Estimate only. This is an estimate for information only, not financial or tax advice. Confirm your own numbers with payroll or a qualified financial adviser before making changes.
Enter your salary and sacrifice amount
Your real net cost, the pension added, and how it compares to a personal contribution appear here as you type.
Why salary sacrifice usually beats a personal contribution
With salary sacrifice, you formally give up part of your salary in exchange for your employer paying that amount into your pension instead. Because the sacrificed amount never counts as your pay, you avoid Income Tax on it AND employee National Insurance (8% up to the Upper Earnings Limit, 2% above it) — savings a normal personal pension contribution can't match, since standard relief-at-source contributions only recover basic-rate tax automatically and never touch National Insurance at all. Your employer saves too, in the form of reduced employer National Insurance, and some employers choose to add some or all of that saving back into your pension as a bonus contribution. The trade-off is a lower headline salary, which can occasionally affect other things calculated from it — mortgage applications, statutory pay, and salary-linked benefits — so it's worth checking those before sacrificing a large amount.