Student Finance England 2026/27: how much you get, who qualifies and what you repay

Student finance in England is two separate loans applied for in one form. The Tuition Fee Loan pays the university directly and never passes through your hands. The Maintenance Loan is money to live on, paid into your account in three instalments a year. Neither is a grant, both are repaid from income after you finish, and the amount you repay has nothing to do with how much you borrowed.

Below are the figures for the 2026/27 academic year, who they apply to, and what repayment really costs. All amounts come from GOV.UK.

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How much is student finance in England for 2026/27?

The Tuition Fee Loan covers fees of up to £9,790 a year for a full-time course. You do not see this money and you cannot spend it on anything else.

The Maintenance Loan depends on where you live while studying, and the maximums are: £9,118 living at home with parents, £10,830 living away from home outside London, £14,135 living away from home in London, and £12,403 for a year of a UK course spent studying abroad. Students aged 60 or over on the first day of the course are funded on a separate, lower scale.

Those are ceilings, not entitlements. The full maintenance figure goes to students from the lowest-income households; above that it tapers down as household income rises.

Who qualifies for student finance in England?

Full support — both loans — goes to UK nationals, Irish citizens and people with settled status who meet three conditions at once: home in England, a recognised university and course, and three years of continuous residence in the UK, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man immediately before the first day of the first academic year. Holidays and short trips do not break that three-year period.

If your status is anything else — pre-settled status, refugee or humanitarian protection, limited leave to remain, one of the Ukraine schemes, a family member of an EU citizen — the answer is not a simple yes or no. Some of these give full support, some give the Tuition Fee Loan only, some give nothing, and the rules turn on dates and on which scheme you hold. Do not take an answer on this from a forum or a chat group: run your own case through the official eligibility checker on GOV.UK, which asks for your status and start date and gives a definite answer. If you hold a Student visa, you are an international fee payer and English student finance is not available to you at all.

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Is the Maintenance Loan means-tested, and what if your parents will not help?

Yes, it is means-tested, and this is where most of the disappointment happens. If you are under 25, unmarried and have not supported yourself for long enough, you count as a dependent student: the loan is calculated from your parents’ household income, whether or not they intend to give you a penny. The state assumes the gap between the reduced loan and the full amount comes from them. If they refuse, the loan does not grow to compensate.

You can be assessed as independent — on your own income instead — if you are 25 or over on the first day of the academic year, are married or in a civil partnership, have a child you support, have no contact with your parents, or have supported yourself for at least three years. Each of these has to be evidenced rather than stated. For 2026/27, care leavers can choose to borrow the maximum without any household income assessment.

When and how do you apply?

Through a Student Finance England account, in one application that covers both loans. Three things are worth knowing. You can apply before you have a confirmed place and change the university later — waiting for results is the most common way to be left without money in September. Applications open in the spring for a course starting that autumn and close months before term; the deadline for each year is published on GOV.UK, and a late application does not lose you the loan but does delay the first payment, often past the start of term. And if you are a dependent student, your parents have to supply their income separately, which is the step that most often stalls an otherwise finished application.

How much do you repay, and when?

Repayment starts in the April after you leave the course, and only once your income passes a threshold. Courses in England that started on or after 1 August 2023 are on Plan 5: you repay 9% of everything you earn above £25,000 a year. On £30,000 that is £37 a month; on £25,000 or less it is nothing at all.

Older and other loans sit on different plans: Plan 1 at 9% above £26,900, Plan 2 at 9% above £29,385, Plan 4 (Scottish borrowers) at 9% above £33,795, and a postgraduate loan at 6% above £21,000. If you have both an undergraduate and a postgraduate loan, the two run at the same time.

Two features matter more than the interest rate. Repayment is taken from salary by the employer, like tax, so it stops by itself when your income drops. And a Plan 5 balance is written off forty years after repayment was due to begin, whatever is left on it. For most graduates this is less a debt than an additional rate of tax for a fixed period — which is why paying it off early is rarely the best use of spare money.

What happens if you leave the UK or drop out?

The loan does not disappear and it is not written off early. If you move abroad you must tell the Student Loans Company and arrange repayment directly with them, against a threshold set for the country you live in; ignoring this is what turns a manageable balance into penalty charges and a bill on your next return. If you leave the course partway through, the Tuition Fee Loan already paid to the university stays yours to repay, and maintenance payments stop from the date you withdraw — so telling the university and Student Finance the same week you stop attending is worth real money.

What student finance does not cover

It is tuition and living costs, nothing else. Visa fees, the immigration health surcharge, equipment beyond the ordinary, course trips and professional exams are outside it, as are postgraduate courses, which have their own smaller loan. Extra help exists but is applied for separately: Disabled Students’ Allowance, the Childcare Grant and Parents’ Learning Allowance, and the hardship funds that individual universities run and rarely advertise — ask the student services office directly rather than waiting to be offered.

One warning. Because these are real sums paid by the state, they attract people selling a “scheme”: apply for a course, take the money, never attend. We took that apart separately: why the £25,000 ‘scheme’ ends in debt and a fraud case.