Your UK State Pension if you live in the EU

You can get your UK State Pension anywhere in the world if you've paid enough UK National Insurance. Living in the EU, the wider European Economic Area or Switzerland, it also goes up every year, as it does in the UK. The full new State Pension is £241.30 a week in 2026/27, about £12,548 a year.

The calculator uses UK income tax. If you're taxed where you live, its tax figures won't match yours, so this example sets incomes before tax. Worked example: someone aged 62 living in the EU, retiring at 62 with a UK pension, savings and a UK State Pension forecast of £10,800 a year from 67. Your money lasts to 95, with £67,448 left.

Getting paid abroad

• You claim within 4 months of your State Pension age, through the International Pension Centre or its international claim form.
• It can be paid into a bank in the country you live in, or a UK bank. Money converted into your local currency has a 0.39% conversion charge.
• You can be paid every 4 or 13 weeks.
• It's paid in one country. If you split the year between two, you choose which.
• You may be sent a "life certificate" to sign and return. Payments can be suspended if it isn't sent back.

Yearly increases

Your UK State Pension only goes up each year if you live in:

• the European Economic Area (the EU plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway)
• Gibraltar
• Switzerland
• a country with a social security agreement with the UK, except Canada and New Zealand

Elsewhere you don't get the yearly increases. It goes up to the current rate if you come back to live in the UK.

Tax

• People who aren't UK resident don't usually pay UK tax on the State Pension.
• The country you live in may tax it. A double taxation agreement between that country and the UK decides where pensions are taxed, and you can claim relief if you're taxed twice.
• Most UK private pensions are covered by those agreements too. Most UK government pensions, such as the civil service's, are only taxed in the UK.
• British citizens and citizens of EEA countries can usually claim the UK personal allowance against UK income, using form R43.

Filling National Insurance gaps: the April 2026 change

The rules for voluntary National Insurance from abroad changed on 6 April 2026, following Budget 2025:

• No more Class 2 for time abroad from the 2026/27 tax year. Class 2 is £3.65 a week in 2026/27, for those who can still pay it in the UK.
• Class 3 costs £18.40 a week in 2026/27, £957 for a full year.
• Ten years, not three. To pay Class 3 for time abroad after 5 April 2026 you need to have lived in the UK for 10 years in a row, or paid 10 years of qualifying contributions.
• Applied before 6 April 2026? The old three-year rule can still apply to Class 3 for 2026/27 if you applied for 2024/25 or 2025/26 by 5 April 2026, pay for those years by 5 April 2027, and apply for 2026/27 by 5 April 2027.
• You can usually fill gaps from the last 6 years. The deadline is 5 April each year, and you apply with form CF83.

If your record started after April 2016 and you're below the full amount, each extra qualifying year adds a 35th of the full new State Pension: about £359 a year in 2026/27, for £957 of Class 3. Whether a year adds anything depends on your own record, which your State Pension forecast shows.

Healthcare

If you live in an EU country and get a UK State Pension, you may be entitled to state healthcare there paid for by the UK, using an S1 form registered in the country where you live. GOV.UK has a page for each country.

State pension age is the same

Your State Pension age doesn't change if you live abroad. It's set by your date of birth: see state pension age by birth year.