Employer NI & Hire Cost - UK 2026/27 by ReadyStack

Type the salary you are about to offer and see what it actually costs you a year, a month and an hour on the rates in force from 6 April 2026: 15% employer NI above a £5,000 threshold, the £10,500 Employment Allowance as a pot that runs out, and pension on the qualifying earnings band.


Click Add to Firefox on this page. Nothing to unzip, no developer mode - the free version runs right away.

• 2026/27 rates, not last year's — Employer NI is 15% on everything above a £5,000 secondary threshold from 6 April 2026. The figures most people and most chatbots still quote - 13.8% above £9,100 - understate a £32,000 hire by £890 a year.
• Employment Allowance is a pot, not a discount — The £10,500 is per business per tax year, not per employee. Type in what you have left and only that much is applied to this hire, so a second or third hire stops looking cheaper than it is.
• Pension on qualifying earnings, not the whole salary — The 3% employer minimum is charged on earnings between £6,240 and £50,270. Charging it on the full salary overstates a £30,000 hire by £187 a year, and the same error the other way understates a part-timer.
• Under-21s, apprentices and veterans are 0% to £50,270 — Pick the category and the threshold moves from £5,000 to £50,270. A 20-year-old on £24,000 costs £0 in employer NI, not £2,850 - the single biggest swing in this calculation.
• Cost per hour, and a National Living Wage check — Divides the fully loaded cost by your contracted hours so you can compare a hire against a day rate, and flags the salary if it falls under the £12.71 National Living Wage that applies from April 2026.

| You type | |
|---|---|
| Gross salary you are offering | default 32000 |
| Employee category | default standard |
| Employment Allowance you have left this tax year | default 0 |
| Employer pension contribution | default 3 |
| Pension charged on | default qualifying |
| Annual pay bill over £3m (Apprenticeship Levy applies) | default False |
| Other yearly costs: laptop, software, insurance, desk | default 1500 |
| Contracted hours | default 37.5 |

| It answers | |
|---|---|
| Total cost to employ | £ / year |
| Cost per month | £ |
| On-cost on top of the salary | % |
| True cost per hour worked | £ |
| Employer NI before Employment Allowance | £ / year |
| Employment Allowance this hire uses up | £ |
| Employer NI you actually pay | £ / year |
| Employer pension | £ / year |
| Apprenticeship Levy | £ / year |
| Checks | |

Permissions requested: storage, downloads


Free: the calculation in the popup, no key, no limit. Full version ($60): download the result as .csv - one licence key per person or team seat. Get it: https://getreadystack.com/api/buy/cl/polar_cl_GfFrPVXpRpmR3w3163VT9zsBElPZr6m5ZBXOW4CujBF


When you use the tool, the extension sends one anonymous count a day (the tool’s name only — no inputs, no personal data). Turn it off on the first page after install. Firefox asks first and sends nothing unless you allow it. A licence key is checked with the payment provider (Polar) only when you enter one.