What do you want to work out?

Will my money last?

One answer, then the reasons: whether your pensions and savings carry the income you want to the age you plan for, what it would take to break the plan, and what would fix it.

What will my family receive?

What your estate is worth at the age you plan to, the inheritance tax on it under the rules as they will stand — pensions included from April 2027 — and what your family actually receives after tax.

Every action the tool knows, ranked by what it saves at your figures and each with a switch: gifts out of income, using the tax-free cash, the order to draw money, charity, life cover in trust, and the allowances you are not using this tax year.

How is my money invested?

A risk level from six questions and what the plan can absorb; five levels with real UK history (worst year, worst decade, largest fall) and what each means for your pot in pounds; the return your plan needs against what your mix should earn; funds, building blocks and gilts that hold a level, as dated facts; and what fees cost over a lifetime.

What if?

Save the plan as it stands, change anything, and compare the saved plans side by side on estate, tax, what the family receives, the pension left and the retirement verdict — plus nineteen single-question calculators that use the same rules.

Calculators

What do I take home?

Income tax, National Insurance and what is left, with a pension contribution taken off first.

What does £1 into my pension cost me?

Relief at your marginal rate, and the NI saved when it is sacrificed from pay.

How much can I still put in this year?

The allowance after any taper or the money-purchase limit, the headroom, and an assumed carry-forward.

What do I need to save for a pot of £X?

Enter the pot you want at an age, in today's money; see what current saving gets and the extra needed.

How long will my pot last?

Draw an income from a pot and see when it runs out — as planned, with a poor first decade, and with lower growth.

What income can my savings sustain?

The most a pot and savings can pay every year, rising with inflation, to the horizon age — the plan's answer, not a rule of thumb.

Is buying National Insurance years worth it?

Years short of the full state pension, what a year costs and what it pays back.

What would inheritance tax be today?

The estate against the nil-rate bands as they stand.

Is my gift still counted?

The seven-year clock, the taper band and the tax on the recipient if you died in N years.

Annuity or drawdown?

The same pot bought as an annuity at typical rates, or drawn at that income until it runs out.

Take the bigger lump sum, or keep the pension?

The commutation factor your scheme is offering against what the income would cost to buy, and the age at which keeping the pension wins.

What do my fees cost me?

A pot with your charges against the same pot at 0.2% a year.

What is the capital gains tax on a sale?

Shares, funds or a property: the gain after the exempt amount, at 18% or 24%.

Invest a lump sum or drip it in?

How often investing at once has beaten spreading it over a year, in UK history for a mix.

Overpay the mortgage or invest?

The after-tax return an investment needs to beat the mortgage rate.

How long might I live?

Expected age and the odds of reaching 75, 85, 90 and 95 — for one person or the second of a couple.

How many years of care could we fund?

Years of care from income and wealth before the means-test threshold.

What does equity release cost the estate?

A lump sum today and the debt that rolls up against the home.

What would a gilt ladder pay?

One gilt maturing each year for N years, priced off today's yield curve, with what it returns after tax and the savings rate that would match it.

Conventional or index-linked?

The two gilts nearest your holding period, and which pays more per £10,000 at your own inflation guess — with the breakeven the market is pricing and the crossover after tax.

What does a 1% rate rise cost me?

The fall in pounds if yields rise ½, 1 or 2 points — and the gain if they fall — for a gilt from the register or a bond fund by its duration.

What is £X in another year's money?

Inflation between two years from UK history, then the assumed rate.

Guides

Barbell, ladder or bullet — three ways to hold gilts

The same £100,000 of UK government bonds can be held as a ladder (one gilt a year), a bullet (all in one maturity) or a barbell (very short plus very long). What each is, a live example priced off today's yield curve, what happens to each if yields fall 1.5 points, rise 1 point or the curve steepens, and what each shape is really a bet on.

Gifts and the seven-year rule — how giving money away reduces inheritance tax

How lifetime gifts work for UK inheritance tax — the seven-year rule, taper relief, the £3,000 annual exemption, gifts out of income, and how much you can safely give without running short — with examples.

Building a gilt ladder for retirement income — how it works and what it pays

How a ladder of UK government gilts gives a known income for the years before or into retirement, why gains on gilts are free of capital gains tax, what today's yields pay, and how to compare it with a savings account or a bond fund.

How good is a final salary pension — and should you take the bigger lump sum?

What a defined-benefit pension of £10,000 a year is actually worth, why the inflation caps matter, how the commutation trade (a bigger tax-free lump for less pension) really prices, and the one question the FCA says only an adviser may answer.

Index-linked gilts — how they work and how they lose money

How UK index-linked gilts are indexed, what a real yield and breakeven inflation mean with today's numbers, and the six ways they lose money — real yields rising (2022, from the Bank of England's own figures), buying above par at a negative real yield, inflation undershooting the breakeven, the 2030 switch from RPI to CPIH, the missing deflation floor, and tax on the coupons — each in pounds.

How much inheritance tax will my estate pay?

A plain-English guide to the UK inheritance tax sums for 2026-27 — the £325,000 nil-rate band, the £175,000 home allowance, the £2m taper, couples, charity, and pensions joining the estate from April 2027 — with a worked example.

What pension pot do I need for a minimum, moderate or comfortable retirement?

The PLSA Retirement Living Standards for 2025 (£13,900 / £32,700 / £45,400 for one person; £22,500 / £45,400 / £62,700 for a couple), what the state pension covers, and the pot that fills the gap — by rule of thumb and by a proper plan.

Pensions join the estate for inheritance tax from April 2027 — what it means for you

From 6 April 2027 unused pension pots count towards inheritance tax. Who is affected, how much it can cost, the double tax after 75, and what people are doing about it — with the numbers.

What is a safe withdrawal rate in the UK? The 4% rule against 150 years of British history

The 4% rule comes from US history. Run the same test on UK returns since 1871 and the always-survived rate for a balanced mix over 30 years is about 2.9% — and 4% failed roughly one retirement start in four. The full table by asset mix and retirement length, why holding fewer shares made the worst case worse, and what actually raises the safe rate.

What is a factor? Value, quality, size and momentum on your fund's factsheet

The words value, quality, small cap, momentum and low volatility appear on fund factsheets and in fund names. What each one means in plain English, what a fund with that tilt actually holds and how it differs from a plain tracker, what each did in good and bad decades (with sources dated), whether a planner needs any of it, and how to spot a tilt on a factsheet.

Where should the next £1,000 go? The UK money order of operations

The order that answers most UK money questions — emergency cushion, expensive debt, the employer pension match, pension vs LISA vs ISA, this year's allowances, then the estate — with the arithmetic behind each step, and a planner that shows which step you are on with your own figures.