Middle earners repay the most.
The UK student loan is sold as a fair deal. On a middle income it’s a real, expensive debt — see where you land on the curve.
Four rules decide what you repay
No estimates or averages hidden in the model — these are the published figures for the 2026/27 tax year, applied plainly.
You repay above a set salary
On Plan 2 you pay 9% of everything you earn over £29,376 a year. Earn less in a month and you repay nothing that month.
Interest is linked to RPI
The balance grows with inflation. Interest runs from RPI up to RPI + 3%, set by how much you earn — not by a fixed headline rate.
The balance clears at 30 years
Anything unpaid 30 years after you were first due to repay is cancelled. On a middle income, reaching that point is the norm, not the exception.
GOV.UK figures, kept current
Thresholds, repayment rates and the RPI figure come straight from GOV.UK and the Bank of England, and are refreshed when they change.
What changes your total
Each figure is the change to lifetime repayment for your selection above (£45,000 · Plan 2) — everything else held constant.
Voluntary payments clear the balance about 10 years early and cut off the interest that would otherwise keep rolling up.
A higher salary clears the loan before the write-off, so you pay less overall — not more.
A year at little or no income pauses repayments; with the balance written off anyway, you simply repay less over the term.
Go deeper on your own numbers
Free, independent, and built on the same GOV.UK figures as the calculator above.