Year to date (YTD) pay is the running total of what you have earned and had deducted in your current job since the tax year began on 6 April, up to and including your latest payslip. MoneyHelper describes this as a summary of the year to date, showing how much you have been paid so far in the financial year, which runs from 6 April to 5 April. The figures grow with every payday and reset to zero when the new tax year starts.
This guide explains each YTD figure, shows a worked example, and covers the cases that confuse people most: YTD that does not match your own sums, YTD after a job change, and YTD with a cumulative tax code.
TL;DR
- YTD figures are cumulative totals for the current tax year (6 April to 5 April) in your current employment, not for the calendar year.
- Gross pay YTD is your earnings before deductions. Taxable pay YTD can be lower, for example after salary sacrifice pension contributions.
- Income tax is worked out cumulatively using your YTD figures. National Insurance is calculated period by period.
- If YTD looks wrong, compare it with your earlier payslips, your tax code and your P45 or P60, then ask your employer's payroll team.
- Keeping every payslip in one place makes these checks quick, especially when you change jobs.
Table of Contents
- What year to date means on a UK payslip
- Which figures have a YTD version
- A worked example
- Why YTD and cumulative tax go together
- Why your YTD may not match your own sums
- Checking your YTD against official records
- YTD when you change jobs or have two jobs
- What you can use YTD figures for
- How MyPay helps you keep YTD figures in order
- Our perspective
- FAQ
- Sources
What year to date means on a UK payslip
On most UK payslips the YTD figures sit in a separate block, often at the bottom right, headed "year to date", "totals this year" or simply "YTD". The Low Incomes Tax Reform Group (LITRG) explains that this section shows the amounts earned and the deductions taken off for the tax year to date, including the current pay period.
Three points are worth fixing in your mind:
- It follows the tax year, not the calendar year. The UK tax year starts on 6 April. The Money Charity's Money Manual 2026 notes that many employers treat April as Month 1 of the new tax year.
- It is per employment. The totals cover pay from the employer named on the payslip. If you have two jobs, each payslip carries its own YTD figures.
- It includes the current payslip. The latest pay period is already inside the total, so you do not add it again.
If you are not sure which other lines on the slip matter, our guide on how to read your payslip goes through the whole document line by line.
Which figures have a YTD version
YTD figures commonly appear for several items, according to Be Payroll: gross pay, tax, National Insurance, pensions where shown, and net pay. The exact layout depends on the employer's payroll software.
| YTD figure | What it shows | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Gross pay YTD | Total earnings before deductions since 6 April | Can include salary, overtime, bonuses, holiday pay and statutory payments |
| Taxable pay YTD | The part of your pay that income tax is worked out on | Can be lower than gross pay |
| Tax paid YTD | Income tax (PAYE) deducted so far this tax year | Recalculated on each payday if you are on a cumulative code |
| NI paid YTD | Employee National Insurance paid so far | The sum of separate period calculations |
| Pension YTD | Your pension contributions so far, where shown | Appears on many, not all, payslips |
| Net pay YTD | Take-home pay received so far | Not always printed |
Gross pay YTD
Gross pay YTD is your total earnings before deductions since the start of the tax year. Be Payroll says it may include items such as salary or wages, overtime, bonuses, holiday pay and statutory payments. Key Portfolio gives the same picture: all taxable earnings, including holiday pay and statutory payments. If you want to see how gross relates to what lands in your account, read our explainer on gross pay vs net pay.
Taxable pay YTD
"Taxable pay YTD" is a common search because it looks like it should equal gross pay, and often it does not. PayslipIQ explains that taxable pay may be your gross pay minus pre-tax deductions such as salary sacrifice pension contributions. DavidsonMorris, a UK employment law firm, adds that some payments, such as approved mileage, some expenses or employer pension contributions, are not subject to income tax, which is another reason the two totals can differ.
So the answer to "is YTD the same as gross income?" is: only YTD gross pay is your gross income from that employer. YTD taxable pay, YTD tax and YTD NI are separate totals.
Tax and National Insurance YTD
Tax paid YTD is the income tax taken through PAYE so far. NI YTD is the National Insurance you have paid so far. For 2025/26, PayStub Guru states that employee National Insurance was 8% on earnings between the Primary Threshold of £12,570 a year (£1,048 a month) and the Upper Earnings Limit of £50,270 a year, and 2% above that. Check GOV.UK for the rates that apply in the current tax year.
A worked example
A worked example from PayslipIQ makes the logic visible. Take someone earning £2,500 gross a month on tax code 1257L. By the end of month 6 (September), the YTD figures are:
| Line | YTD at month 6 |
|---|---|
| Gross pay | £15,000 |
| Personal Allowance used | £6,285 |
| Taxable pay | £8,715 |
| Tax paid | £1,743 |
The sums are straightforward. Six months of £2,500 is £15,000. Code 1257L means a Personal Allowance of £12,570 a year, so six months of it is £6,285. Subtract that from gross pay and you get £8,715 of taxable pay. At the basic rate of 20%, that gives £1,743 of tax. If you want to know what the 1257L code itself means, see our guide to the 1257L tax code.
This is also the answer to "how do I calculate year-to-date pay?". For gross pay, add up the gross pay from every payslip since 6 April. PayStub Guru gives the formula as the sum of all gross pay since the start of the tax year, including basic salary, overtime, bonuses, commissions, taxable allowances and statutory payments such as Statutory Sick Pay and Statutory Maternity Pay. For net figures, Datamatics CPA describes the basic calculation as gross income minus total deductions and tax from the start of the tax year to the current pay period.
LITRG gives a useful warning here: if you earned different amounts each month, your year-to-date totals are not simply a multiple of one month's figures. Multiplying the latest month by the number of months only works for a fixed salary.
Why YTD and cumulative tax go together
UK income tax through PAYE is normally cumulative. The Income Tax (Pay As You Earn) Regulations 2003 require tax to be deducted or repaid using total payments to date and total tax to date. That is why YTD figures matter: payroll systems use them each payday to decide how much tax to take.
In practice, PayslipIQ explains that the tax YTD figure is recalculated from scratch on every payday from your total earnings to date. National Insurance is different. It is not cumulative, and the NI YTD figure is just the sum of the separate calculations for each period.
This has a practical effect. If one month's tax looks odd, a later payslip can correct it, because the system compares what you should have paid on your total pay so far with what you have actually paid. A bonus month can show a high tax deduction, and a lower-paid month afterwards can bring the YTD figure back into line.
The exception is a week 1 or month 1 (W1/M1) code, sometimes called an emergency code. It treats each pay period on its own and does not use your YTD totals. It is common at the start of a new job when your employer does not yet have your previous pay details. Our guide to emergency tax explains how to spot it and how it gets corrected.
Why your YTD may not match your own sums
The most common worry behind searches for a YTD mismatch is that the total on the latest payslip differs from what you get by adding earlier slips. There are several ordinary reasons.
- A tax code change. Be Payroll says YTD figures may change because of tax code updates, backdated pay adjustments, corrections for previous payroll periods or statutory payment recalculations.
- Backdated pay. A pay rise agreed in July but paid in September can push the YTD gross above your expectation for earlier months.
- Items you did not count. Overtime, bonuses, holiday pay and statutory payments all go into gross YTD. A missed line on your own list is the usual culprit.
- A correction carried forward. Capium notes that YTD figures update every payroll run and carry forward, so one mistake can affect later YTD totals on subsequent payslips.
- A payroll system change. CIPP guidance reports that when an employer moves to new payroll software and creates duplicate employment records, YTD information can become incorrect.
A simple check takes ten minutes. Lay out your payslips for the year in order, add the gross pay from each, and compare the total with the latest YTD gross. If they match, the gap lies in how you read the figure. If they differ, look for a month with backdated pay or a change of tax code.
When the numbers still do not add up, our guide to payslip errors lists what to look for and who to contact. Raise it with your employer's payroll team first. They can correct figures and, where needed, send the update to HMRC.
Checking your YTD against official records
You do not have to rely on the payslip alone. LITRG notes that although year-to-date pay and tax figures are not actually required by law on payslips, most employers include them to make things clear and help you reconcile the figures. It also says you can view year-to-date figures for taxable income, income tax paid and National Insurance contributions paid through your HMRC personal tax account.
GOV.UK sets out a two-step way to check if the tax on your payslip is correct:
- Compare the tax code on your payslip with the tax code HMRC holds for you, using the Income Tax service or the HMRC app.
- Check how the code has been used: enter the gross pay and tax code from your payslip into the "estimate your tax for the current year" tool and compare the result with the tax shown on the payslip.
At the end of the tax year, your P60 should show total pay, tax deducted, employee National Insurance contributions and employee pension contributions. PayStub Guru says these should match the YTD totals on your final payslip for 2025/26. That makes the P60 the cleanest end-of-year test of your YTD column.
YTD when you change jobs or have two jobs
Your YTD resets for each employer. When you start a new job mid-year, your new payslip begins with that employer's own totals, not your whole year's earnings.
Your previous pay still matters for tax, though. LITRG explains that the P45 includes your pay and tax totals to date in the tax year, and gives a link so PAYE can continue on the correct basis with the new employer. For employees on a cumulative tax code, LITRG's guidance on leaving says the P45 should include overall pay and tax totals for the tax year so far, including from earlier jobs in the same year. The PAYE Regulations also require the new employer to record the total payments to date from the P45 where it shows a cumulative basis.
Two practical habits help:
- Keep your P45 safe and hand part 3 to your new employer promptly, so they do not start you on an emergency code.
- Save your final payslip from the old job. Its YTD column is the record of what you earned and paid there.
If you work two jobs at once, each employer's payslip shows only its own YTD, and only one of them normally gets your Personal Allowance. Our guide on tax with two jobs shows how to read both payslips together.
What you can use YTD figures for
YTD figures are useful beyond payslip checking. Key Portfolio notes they can help if you need to prove your income, for example on a mortgage application, or if you want to know your overall gross earnings at any point in the tax year.
Common uses include:
- Loan and mortgage applications. Lenders often ask for recent payslips. The YTD gross shows earnings to date in one figure.
- Budgeting. Comparing YTD tax and NI month to month shows whether deductions are stable.
- Spotting changes. A sudden jump in YTD tax with no pay change is a prompt to look at your tax code.
- Self-assessment and tax queries. YTD totals from the final payslip help you match your P60 to HMRC's records.
All of these depend on having the payslips to hand. That is harder than it sounds when you move between employers or agencies and each uses a different portal.
How MyPay helps you keep YTD figures in order
MyPay is a digital platform for people who want their payslips and employment records in one secure place. You upload, organise and retrieve payslips from different employers, and compare them side by side to see differences in earnings, tax deductions and other details. That makes a YTD check practical: you can place two months next to each other, or compare an old and a new job, without searching through email attachments or expired employer logins.
MyPay also gives you a personal workspace that keeps your data separate from employer access, plus budgeting tools to follow changes in your income. If you want to see how it works, visit How MyPay works, or go to the MyPay home page to get started.
If you want a quick estimate of what a salary becomes after deductions, the take-home pay calculator is free to use.
Our perspective
Most payslip problems we see described are not mistakes in the maths. They are missing context. A YTD figure is only useful when you can see the figures that came before it, and most people do not have those in one place.
Payslips arrive by email, in employer portals, on paper, or through an agency system you lose access to when the contract ends. A year later, the very document that proves your income or explains a tax change can be hard to find.
That is why MyPay is built around a personal workspace rather than an employer-controlled one. Your records stay yours, separate from employer access, and they remain available after you leave the job. Side-by-side comparison then does the work that a calculator and a spreadsheet would otherwise do: you see how gross pay, tax and National Insurance changed between two payslips, and you can ask a precise question of payroll when something looks off.
Our advice is simple. Save every payslip as it arrives, read the YTD column each month, and compare it with your P60 when the tax year ends. Small habits like these turn a confusing payslip into a reliable record.
Moeed
FAQ
What does YTD mean on a payslip?
YTD means year to date. It shows the running total of your gross pay, tax, National Insurance and other deductions from 6 April up to the current pay period. MoneyHelper says the financial year runs from 6 April to 5 April.
Is YTD pay the same as my annual salary?
No. YTD pay is what you have been paid so far in the tax year, not your full-year salary. In April it is small, and it grows each payday until the last payslip of the tax year. Only then does it show the full year's pay, which is the figure your P60 reports.
Why did my YTD figures reset?
They reset at the start of each tax year on 6 April, and they also start afresh with a new employer. Be Payroll says YTD figures accumulate during the tax year and reset on 6 April. Your previous employer's totals are carried to your new one for tax purposes through the P45, not through your payslip YTD.
Can I see my YTD figures without a payslip?
Yes, for tax figures. LITRG says you can view year-to-date figures for taxable income, income tax paid and National Insurance contributions paid through your HMRC personal tax account. Comparing those with your latest payslip is a good way to confirm both agree.
What should I do if my YTD looks wrong?
First add up your own payslips and check your tax code against the one HMRC holds, following the GOV.UK checking steps. If the difference remains, contact your employer's payroll team with the payslips and the figures that differ, so they can correct it.
Sources
- Understanding your payslip | MoneyHelper
- Getting paid | Low Incomes Tax Reform Group
- The Money Manual 2026 | The Money Charity
- What Does Year-To-Date (YTD) Mean on a Payslip? | Be Payroll
- What are the YTD figures on my pay advice slip? | Key Portfolio
- YTD on Your Payslip: What It Means and Why It Matters | PayslipIQ
- YTD on Payslips: Employer HR Guide | DavidsonMorris
- UK Payslip YTD Calculations 2026 | PayStub Guru
- What Does YTD Mean on a Payslip? | Datamatics CPA
- The Income Tax (Pay As You Earn) Regulations 2003, Part 3
- The Income Tax (Pay As You Earn) Regulations 2003, regulation 43
- Check if the tax on your payslip is correct | GOV.UK
- PAYE starter procedure | Low Incomes Tax Reform Group
- Employee leaving | Low Incomes Tax Reform Group
- RTI submission problems | CIPP