Accountant salary UK 2026: average pay, take-home and salary range
The average accountant salary is £55,414. Compare gross and estimated after-tax monthly pay, the published salary range, and clear context for chartered, starting and London accountant salaries.
How to read the official accountant salary figure
Accountant is a broad everyday label, but the official group on this page is narrower. It covers chartered and certified accountants, not every bookkeeper, accounts assistant, finance manager or finance director. That matters when you compare your own pay. Within this group, typical full-time salary is above the typical full-time UK pay and the higher published point is much further up.
The ONS has marked this estimate as reasonably precise rather than precise, so it deserves a little more caution than most pages in this set. Even so, it is a useful national guide for qualified accountants. Sector, location, practice versus industry, management responsibility and the stage reached after qualification can all move an individual salary away from the middle.
Which accounting jobs this figure covers
The official ONS group is chartered and certified accountants. That is narrower than the everyday word accountant, so matching the occupation correctly matters.
Good fit for this page
- Qualified chartered or certified accountants
- Practice, industry and public-sector roles that map to the qualified accountant group
- Employee salaries before separately valuing bonus or partnership profit
Use a different comparison for
- Bookkeepers, payroll administrators and accounts assistants
- Every finance manager or finance director automatically
- Self-employed practice turnover or partner drawings treated as a salary
Lower, typical and higher accountant pay
Only £7,301 separates the median from the published 60th percentile. A quick glance cannot show where your own pay sits inside that band or how close you are to the next salary point.
- Lower pay10th percentile£29,557
- Lower-middle pay25th percentile£38,696
- Typical payMedian£50,062
- Higher pay75th percentile£68,056
Moving from the median to the published 60th percentile is £7,301 gross a year, or about £355 more a month after standard tax and employee National Insurance.
Confirm the right occupation, place your salary against the official qualified-accountant range, and see take-home pay and True Wage in the same report.
From the median to the published 60th percentile is £7,301 gross a year, worth about £355 more a month after standard tax and employee National Insurance.
Every published accountant salary point
See every published salary point
| Pay point | Annual salary | How to read it |
|---|---|---|
| 10th percentile | £29,557 | Below the occupation midpoint |
| 20th percentile | £36,981 | Below the occupation midpoint |
| 25th percentile | £38,696 | Below the occupation midpoint |
| 30th percentile | £40,384 | Below the occupation midpoint |
| 40th percentile | £44,941 | Below the occupation midpoint |
| Median | £50,062 | The published midpoint |
| 60th percentile | £57,363 | Above the occupation midpoint |
| 70th percentile | £63,452 | Above the occupation midpoint |
| 75th percentile | £68,056 | Above the occupation midpoint |
| 80th percentile | £73,506 | Above the occupation midpoint |
The paid report estimates a position between two published points. It does not claim an exact ranking of every worker.
Accountant salary per month and after tax
At the average accountant salary of £55,414, gross pay is about £4,618 a month. A standard 2026/27 estimate gives accountant take-home pay of about £3,558 a month after tax and employee National Insurance. The ONS median remains £50,062 and is shown in the detailed pay range below.
The estimate uses the standard Personal Allowance, Income Tax bands for England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and employee National Insurance. It does not include pension, student loan, salary sacrifice or a different tax code. Scottish Income Tax is different.
Average accountant salary and the wider pay range
The lower published point is £29,557, the typical salary is £50,062, and the highest published point, the 80th percentile is £73,506. The simple average is £55,414, which is pulled upwards by higher salaries.
The higher end sits well above the typical salary, which is not surprising for a profession that spans newly qualified roles, specialist work and senior responsibility. The official group is useful for qualified accountants, but it should not be stretched to cover every finance job.
Starting, chartered and London accountant salaries
These searches describe different parts of the accounting market. The ONS figures can provide context, but they should not be turned into separate estimates that the source does not publish.
Starting accountant salary
ONS does not publish a single starting accountant salary in this table. The £29,557 10th-percentile point shows the lower end of full-time pay in the chartered and certified accountant group; it is not a guaranteed trainee or graduate rate.
Chartered accountant salary
This page is built from the official chartered and certified accountants group. Its median salary is £50,062 and its simple average is £55,414. Qualification, time after qualification, sector and responsibility still make a large difference.
Accountant salary in London
The figures on this page are UK-wide, not a London accountant salary estimate. London roles can differ because of employer type, labour market and package, so compare the national range with the actual vacancy, hours, bonus and benefits.
Useful next step: compare the deductions on a nearby £55,000 salary, or see how location affects the wider market in the London salary guide.
What usually changes qualified accountant pay
The range covers people at very different points after qualification and in very different types of work. A newly qualified audit senior and an experienced specialist with a team and client book should not be expected to sit at the same point.
Qualification and experience
Professional qualification is part of the scope of this ONS group. Time after qualification and the complexity of work often matter more than the word accountant in the title.
Practice or industry
Client practice, an in-house finance team, the public sector and consultancy bring different deadlines, commercial exposure and promotion routes.
Specialism
Audit, tax, forensic work, financial reporting, advisory and management accounting can carry different responsibilities and market demand.
Clients, teams and leadership
Owning major clients, signing off work, managing staff or moving towards partnership changes the job well beyond preparing a set of accounts.
Qualification, work and progression
The National Careers Service says private-practice accountants prepare accounts and tax returns, produce forecasts, audit records, advise clients and may investigate fraud. Entry can begin with a degree, an apprenticeship, on-the-job training or direct study with a professional body.
Professional routes include bodies such as ICAEW, ACCA, ICAS, CIMA and AIA. The exact route matters because a training contract may include study leave, exam fees and staged pay rises that are not obvious from the starting salary alone.
With experience, accountants may specialise in audit or forensic work, manage a practice team, move towards partnership, become a finance director or work as an independent consultant. Those destinations explain the long upper tail in the salary data.
What to check in an accountant offer
The value of an accountancy package often depends on training support and workload as well as base pay.
- Is the role qualified, part-qualified or a training position?
- Who pays exam fees, professional subscriptions and study leave?
- What are the busy-season hours, overtime expectations and bonus terms?
- Does the title match the real work, client responsibility and management duties?
Where the salary and industry information comes from
The pay figures are from the Office for National Statistics Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, Table 14, 2025 provisional edition. They cover full-time employee jobs, and annual figures normally relate to people who have been in the same job for more than one year. They do not cover self-employed people.
| Official job group | Chartered and certified accountants. It does not cover every finance or accounts role. |
|---|---|
| Quality | ONS rates this estimate reasonably precise (CV above 5% and up to 10%). The published median CV is 6.5%. In plain English, this figure carries a little more uncertainty than the precise estimates on the other pages. |
| Jobs in the estimate | About 60,000 employee jobs |
| Career and role source | National Careers Service: Private practice accountant Qualification routes, duties, professional bodies and progression. View source |
Where ONS leaves a salary point blank, this page leaves it blank too. A missing top 10% figure is never filled with an estimate.
View the ONS salary tableCheck the 2026/27 tax and NI figures
Accountant salary questions
What is the average accountant salary in the UK?
The simple average accountant salary is £55,414. The ONS full-time median is £50,062, which is usually the better starting point for a typical salary because it is less affected by very high pay.
How much is an accountant salary per month after tax?
The £50,062 median is about £4,172 gross per month. A standard 2026/27 estimate gives take-home pay of about £3,297 a month after Income Tax and employee National Insurance, before pension or student loan deductions.
What is a chartered accountant salary in the UK?
The ONS group used here is chartered and certified accountants. Its median full-time salary is £50,062 and its simple average is £55,414, but experience, specialism, sector and management responsibility can move pay away from those figures.
What is a starting accountant salary?
ONS does not publish an official starting salary in this table. The 10th-percentile figure is £29,557, but it covers the lower end of the qualified occupation group and should not be presented as a fixed trainee or graduate rate.
What is an accountant salary in London?
This page uses UK-wide ONS data and does not claim a London-specific figure. For a London role, compare the national range with the vacancy salary, working hours, bonus, qualification stage and total package.
Is £50,062 a good salary for an accountant?
It is the official middle salary for full-time chartered and certified accountants and is 28% higher than the UK full-time median of £39,039.
What do higher-paid accountants earn?
ONS does not publish the 90th percentile for this occupation. The highest available point is the 80th percentile at £73,506, so no top-10% figure is claimed.