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Summary

For the tax year to April 2025, tax reliefs for charities and their donors, where an estimate is available, were around £6.7 billion, up 5% year-on-year.

Estimates for some of the largest tax reliefs are:

• £2.75 billion relief of non-domestic rates (business rates, up 7% on the previous tax year)
• £1.7 billion in Gift Aid paid to charities at the basic rate of Income Tax (up 7% on the previous tax year)
• £980 million Inheritance Tax reliefs for donations (up 2% on the previous year)
• £820 million Higher Rate Relief - relief at higher rates of tax on individuals’ Gift Aided donations (up 8% on the previous tax year)

Gift Aid payments to charities returned to their long-term trend of increasing year-on-year, rising from under £1.3 billion to £1.7 billion over the last decade.

Around half the value of Gift Aid payments went to charities that received less than £1 million each, about the same as the previous year. For more information about Gift Aid, please see the section on Table 2 below.

1.3 million people declared a donation on their Self Assessment return for tax year ending April 2024, about 2% fewer than the previous year. However, the value of their declarations of all types of donations rose by 3%. For more information about donations declared via Self Assessment, see the section on Tables 3, 4 and 5 below.

About this release

Frequency: Annual

Coverage: UK

Theme: Economy

Next release: We expect to publish an update in Summer 2026.

This statistics release is the annual update of reliefs for charities and their donors. Tables 1, 2 and 6 are - this is the new name for National Statistics. Tables 3 to 5 are Official Statistics - this has not changed. There are no other major changes to the way we publish these statistics since the previous update.

Table 1: Summary of UK tax reliefs for charities and donors

For the tax year to April 2025, tax reliefs for charities and their donors, where an annual estimate is available, were around £6.7 billion, up 5% year-on-year.

This is comprised of:

• £4.75 billion of reliefs for charities, up 5%
• £1.92 billion of reliefs for donors, also up 5% year-on-year

Gift Aid

Charities may claim the basic rate of Income Tax on qualifying donations by individuals.

In the tax year to April 2025, HMRC paid charities £1.7 billion in Gift Aid, up 7% on the previous year.

We explore Gift Aid more in the section for Table 2 (below), which breaks down Gift Aid by value of payments per organisation.

Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme

The Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme is related to the main Gift Aid scheme but is much smaller and separate. This scheme permits charities to claim the equivalent of basic rate Income Tax for some smaller donations when the donation is made by someone who is physically present. This is technically government expenditure rather than a tax relief, but we show it in Table 1 for completeness.

Payments under this scheme rose, returning to their pre COVID-19 pandemic level of £40 million in tax year ending April 2025.

Non-domestic rates relief

Also known as ‘business rates relief’, this allows charities an 80% reduction in the corresponding business rate; some authorities top this up by a further 20% resulting in complete exemption.

This relief continues to be the largest single source of tax relief granted directly to charities. In tax year ending April 2025 it is forecast to be £2.75 billion, growing by 7% for the second year in a row.

Stamp Duty Land Tax

This tax is payable when buying or leasing land or property, and is relieved for charities, who do not have to pay it when buying a property. The cost of this relief may vary with changes in the tax regime and property prices as well as other factors.

Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) is collected in England and Northern Ireland. Before April 2018 and April 2015, property transactions in Wales and Scotland respectively were included, but these taxes have now been devolved and replaced with separate land and buildings transaction taxes, and no longer appear here after those dates.

Relief of Stamp Duty Land Tax for charities was down 18% to £270 million in the year to April 2025. The forecast for the cost of SDLT charities relief assumes that trends in sizes and volumes of transactions in the first six months of the financial year will continue. The lower estimated cost of SDLT charities relief is therefore due to relatively fewer claims for this relief in the first 6 months of 2024-25

The figures for the most recent tax years is provisional: we will update this data in the next release of these statistics.

Chart 1a: summary of the above reliefs for charities, £ millions, by tax year ending

Tax Year ending	Gift Aid, £m	Other reliefs claimed with Gift Aid, £m	Business Rates (non-domestic rates), £m	Stamp Duty Land Tax, £m	Total for charities, £m
2019	1,350	10	2,300	360	total £4,020m
2020	1,400	10	2,390	420	total £4,220m
2021	1,380	10	2,390	210	total £3,990m
2022	1,340	Less than 10	2,400	310	total £4,060m
2023	1,600	10	2,410	330	total £4,340m
2024	1,600	10	2,580	330	total £4,510m
2025	1,710	10	2,750	270	total £4,750m

Inheritance Tax (IHT)

This is a wealth transfer tax. Only around 5% of UK deaths result in an Inheritance Tax liability: those that do may reduce the amount due by giving to charity.

For tax year ending April 2025, the tax cost of these reliefs for charitable donations was estimated to be £980 million, slightly higher than the previous year.

There is always some uncertainty in these reliefs for the most recent tax years due to the relatively small number of relatively large estates making bequests, and the longer time between liability arising and information becoming available to HMRC. We will update this column in the next release of these statistics.

Higher rates of tax on Gift Aid

Sometimes called ‘higher rate relief’, this allows individual donors to reclaim tax at a rate equal to the difference between their marginal rate and the basic rate on donations where Gift Aid has already been claimed by a charity. This is explained in more detail in HMRC’s Gift Aid guidance.

For tax year ending April 2025, we will not know the value of donations taxpayers will declare until Self Assessment returns for that year become due in 2026, so we have forecast this figure for the latest complete tax year as usual. Our provisional forecast of higher rate relief is £820million, an increase of 8% year-on-year. We expect that the value of donations rises consistently with an increase in the underlying amounts charities claim via Gift Aid.

Chart 1b: summary of the above reliefs for donors, £ millions, by tax year ending

Tax Year ending	Inheritance Tax, £m	Payroll Giving, £m	Gifts of Shares & Property, £m	Higher rates of tax on Gift Aid, £m	Total reliefs for donors, £m
2019	640	40	80	560	total £1,310m
2020	670	40	130	540	total £1,370m
2021	680	40	100	550	total £1,370m
2022	910	40	90	660	total £1,700m
2023	1,010	40	80	700	total £1,830m
2024	960	40	70	760	total £1,830m
2025	980	40	90	820	total £1,920m

Reliefs for charities and donors which are not in these statistics

Annual estimates for Corporation Tax, Income Tax, Stamp Duty Reserve Tax and VAT reliefs for charities are not available. Charities are in most cases not required to inform HMRC when they use these reliefs, and the cost of collection for statistical purposes is disproportionate.

A one-off estimate for the cost of relief on corporate donations was estimated in Non-structural tax reliefs for the tax year ending April 2022, which was for £880 million.

Table 2: Gift Aid payments to charities

In the year to April 2025, HMRC paid charities and community amateur sports clubs £1.7 billion in Gift Aid, up 7% from the previous year.

Chart 2a: Value of Gift Aid paid to organisations, £ millions, by annual amount to each organisation

Tax year (ending April)	up to £1,000 per org	£1,001 to £5,000	£5,001 to £10,000	£10,001 to £50,000	£50,001 to £100,000	£100,001 to  £1 million	Over £1 million	Total                                       Â
2019 £m	10	60	60	200	90	320	620	total £1,350m
2020 £m	10	60	60	200	90	320	670	total £1,400m
2021 £m	10	60	60	200	90	300	670	total £1,380m
2022 £m	10	50	60	200	90	330	610	total £1,340m
2023 £m	10	50	50	210	90	350	840	total £1,600m
2024 £m	10	50	60	220	100	370	790	total £1,600m
2025 £m	10	60	60	230	110	410	850	total £1,710m

After four years of gentle decline in the total number of organisations benefiting from Gift Aid, there was a slight recovery in the most recent two years, when the number of charities receiving Gift Aid rose 3% to over 66,000 in tax year ending April 2024 and another 2% to over 67,000 in the tax year ending April 2025.

Chart 2b: Number of organisations receiving Gift Aid paid to charities, by annual amount to each organisation

Tax Year (ending April)	up to £1,000 per org	£1,001 to £5,000	£5,001 to £10,000	£10,001 to £50,000	£50,001 to £100,000	£100,001 to  £1 million	Over £1 million	Total
2019	29,000	23,830	7,980	9,770	1,260	1,230	150	Total: 73,220
2020	27,900	23,270	8,140	9,700	1,250	1,220	160	Total: 71,640
2021	26,590	22,970	7,990	9,610	1,270	1,200	160	Total: 69,780
2022	24,750	20,640	7,710	9,670	1,270	1,280	150	Total: 65,470
2023	23,110	20,740	7,620	9,800	1,330	1,370	190	Total: 64,170
2024	23,250	21,870	7,790	10,320	1,420	1,470	190	Total: 66,310
2025	23,050	22,300	8,050	10,630	1,530	1,580	190	Total: 67,320

Tables 3, 4 and 5: Donations declared by individuals completing Self Assessment

At the time of release, Self Assessment data is available up to the tax year ending in April 2024.

Chart 3a: Number of people declaring a donation by Self Assessment

Tax Year ending	Number of donors
2019	1.27 million people
2020	1.28 million people
2021	1.25 million people
2022	1.29 million people
2023	1.33 million people
2024	1.31 million people

The number of individuals declaring a donation via Self Assessment is broadly increasing over time. 1.31 million people have declared a donation via Self Assessment in tax year ending April 2024. However, as usual, we expect there to be some late filing and amendments. When we update our 2024 records in 2026, we expect this figure to rise slightly.

Chart 3b: Value of donations declared via Self Assessment

Tax Year ending	Gift Aided Donations, £bn	Shares / Property donations, £bn	Total ,value £bn
2019	2.9	0.4	total £3.3 billion
2020	3.0	0.7	total £3.7 billion
2021	3.0	0.5	total £3.5 billion
2022	3.5	0.6	total £4.1 billion
2023	3.5	0.5	total £4.0 billion
2024	3.6	0.5	total £4.1 billion

The total value of donations increased from £4.0 billion to £4.1 billion in tax year ending April 2024. This increase is provisional, as the last few tax returns are received and updated. We expect to update this in 2026.

In these tables, we define a ‘donor’ as any individual who entered a donation in the relevant section of a Self Assessment form. That is, either in the form of Gift Aided cash donations or in the form of qualifying assets gifted to charity. It does not include donors who do not submit a Self Assessment return, who typically pay no Income Tax or Capital Gains Tax or the basic rate of Income Tax.

Calculations of donations as a proportion of income exclude individuals with nil income or where the ratio of donation to income was over 100%.

Tables 4 and 5 group this data by several characteristics of Self Assessment taxpayers.

Donations by gross income

Likelihood to donate increases with income. 7% of Self Assessment taxpayers with income under £50,000 declared a donation compared to 36% of those with income over £250,000.

However, donors earning under £50,000 donated the largest proportion of their gross income compared with higher earners, 3.1% of their income on average.

Donations by taxpayer’s age

Likelihood to donate increases with age. 20% of Self Assessment taxpayers 65 or more years old declared a donation.

Donors who were aged 65 and up donated the largest proportion of their gross income compared to younger donors, 3.5% of their income on average.

Donations by taxpayer’s sex

Female Self Assessment taxpayers are a little more likely to declare a donation than male taxpayers: 13% of women and girls compared to 11% of men and boys.

Donations by UK nation, region and Parliamentary constituency

Table 5 provides geographical information and breaks down the total number of individuals declaring a donation via Self Assessment and the total value of those donations by region and Parliamentary constituency.

Self Assessment taxpayers in London and the South East of England were the most likely to donate: 14% and 15% respectively of these declared a donation.

Donors in Northern Ireland donated the highest proportion of their income, 3.9% for the average Northern Ireland donor compared to 2.4% across the UK.

Table 6: Payroll Giving scheme

An employer wishing to set up a Payroll Giving scheme contracts with an agency approved by HMRC. Employees wishing to take part authorise the employer to deduct amounts from their pay and nominate the charities to which their gifts should go. Donations are deducted before tax which reduces the effective tax rate that the employee pays. Payroll Giving donations are not eligible for Gift Aid. The gross amount donated and the number of participating employees are estimated from information provided by Payroll Giving agencies.

This table has been updated to include the tax year ending April 2024. Data for donations in the following tax year is not expected to be available until the next release of these statistics, but we have, as usual, forecast the value of Payroll Giving relief to taxpayers for the most recent tax year, ending April 2025, which is steady at around £40 million. This is shown in the column for Payroll Giving in Table 1.

Tax year ending April	Gross amount donated, £m	Cost of Income Tax relief, £m	Millions of employees participating, previous basis	Thousands of employees participating, current basis
2015	126	40	1.09	not available
2016	131	40	1.11	not available
2017	131	40	1.07	not available
2018	137	40	1.03	not available
2019	133	40	1.09	not available
2020	132	40	not available	591
2021	137	40	not available	545
2022	128	40	not available	516
2023	127	40	not available	483
2024	125	40	not available	504

In April 2019, agency changes to their definition of the number of participating employees removed a group of employees who participated by donating in a previous tax year, but not in the tax year being reported on. This resulted in a large apparent drop in the number of employees. However, this does not reflect a real change in the number of employees donating. We cannot back date previous years with the change in definition, so we show the number of donors from before that date in a separate data series.

Tables of data

This document is a summary of and commentary on our statistics. View the full tables in this release.

Related publications

Whilst we cannot comment on the accuracy of external statistics, these resources offer complementary coverage on UK charities.

• the section on charitable giving in DCMS’s Community Life Survey
• the
• an overview of

Contact us

Statistics contact: We welcome your comments and technical statistics questions on these statistics at personaltax.statistics@hmrc.gov.uk.

Media contact: news.desk@hmrc.gov.uk