Skilled Worker visa changes in 2026 and 2027, with sources
Checked 15 September 2026. From 8 January 2026, new Skilled Worker applicants need English at level B2. The Temporary Shortage List only covers certificates of sponsorship issued before 31 December 2026. A Graduate visa applied for on or after 1 January 2027 lasts 18 months instead of 2 years, or 3 years after a PhD. Doubling the settlement qualifying period to 10 years is proposed, with no rules or start date yet.
Rule changes, recent and scheduled
The snapshot above is what applies today. Below: the changes that shaped it since July 2025, and the ones published or proposed for later, checked 15 September 2026. A proposal is listed as a proposal and never folded into a result. What the Graduate route change means for a job search: the 18-month guide. If yours is ending soon: your options, in date order.
| Change | Status | Dates | What it costs you | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Graduate route falls from two years to eighteen months | In the rules | Act by From | Six months of job-hunting time, which is roughly one graduate recruitment cycle. It is also six months less in which to find a sponsor before the Skilled Worker route becomes the only way to stay. | Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules, 14 October 2025 |
| The Temporary Shortage List closes to new certificates | In the rules | Act by From | Little for most technology roles, which are RQF 6 and sponsorable on their own footing. If the job you are chasing is a support, database, data analyst or technician role that is only eligible through the list, the certificate has to be issued by 30 December 2026. | Immigration Rules: Appendix Skilled Worker (SW 6.1A) |
| English at B2 for new Skilled Worker applicants | In the rules | From | A degree taught in English and awarded by a UK institution still proves your English, so most UK graduates are covered. Without one, you need a Secure English Language Test at B2 before you can apply. | Skilled Worker visa: knowledge of English |
| Degree-level jobs only, and higher salary thresholds | In the rules | From | Medium-skilled roles such as IT user support (3132) and data analyst (3544) stay open to new applicants only through the Temporary Shortage List, and some offers that cleared the old thresholds no longer do. | Skilled Worker visa: going rates for eligible occupation codes |
| Settlement may move from five years to ten | Proposed | No date set | Nothing you can act on yet, and nobody can tell you the answer today. It is here so that a five-year plan built on the current rule is made knowingly rather than by assumption. | Changes to UK visa and settlement rules after the 2025 immigration white paper |
Rules checked 15 September 2026. Next check due by 16 March 2027.
Route snapshot
- Jurisdiction
- United Kingdom
- Route
- Skilled Worker
- Rules in force from
- General threshold
- £41,700, or the occupation going rate if higher
- New-entrant threshold
- £33,400, or 70% of the going rate if higher, using the rounded figure Appendix Skilled Occupations prints for each code (for SOC 2134, £38,300)
- New-entrant conditions
- Under 26; a Student visa at bachelor’s level or above, or a Graduate visa, now or in the last two years; or working towards a recognised qualification, registration or chartered status in the job. Capped at 48 months in total, Graduate visa time included
- Returners
- The new-entrant rate also applies if your most recent UK visa, ignoring visit visas, was a Student visa for a UK degree-level course or a Graduate visa that expired less than two years before you apply; total time on the rate is capped at four years, Graduate visa time included. GOV.UK
- Going rates
- Standard going rates per occupation code from the GOV.UK table updated 22 July 2025 . Only occupations at RQF level 6 and above are open to new applicants since 22 July 2025. Medium-skilled codes on the Temporary Shortage List, including IT user support (3132) and data analysts (3544), stay open for certificates of sponsorship issued before 31 December 2026 (Appendix Skilled Worker, SW 6.1A ).
- English
- New applicants, and anyone switching from another visa, need English at CEFR level B2 from 8 January 2026. People extending or updating a Skilled Worker visa they held before that date stay at B1. A UK degree taught in English counts as proof. JLocate does not check English; GOV.UK lists every way to prove it.
- Label
- Simplified product logic built on the figures above, not the full Immigration Rules. Checked against GOV.UK on 15 September 2026.
Other countries, simplified
Each is a simplified snapshot of the published 2026 rules, dated and linked. They exist so the matching process can be shown across countries; the UK route above remains the most detailed.
| Country | Route | Thresholds | Sponsor model | Checked | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Netherlands | Highly Skilled Migrant | €5,942 a month under 30: €4,357 recent graduate: €3,122 | Public register | 3 September 2026 | |
| Germany | EU Blue Card | €50,700 a year shortage occupation or recent graduate: €45,934 | Any employer may apply | 3 September 2026 | |
| Ireland | Critical Skills Employment Permit | €40,904 a year without a degree: €68,911 | Any employer may apply | 3 September 2026 | |
| United States | H-1B specialty occupation | Set per role | Employer approval, not public | 3 September 2026 | |
| Canada | Temporary Foreign Worker Program (LMIA) | Set per role | Any employer may apply | 3 September 2026 | |
| Australia | Skills in Demand (subclass 482) | A$79,499 a year | Employer approval, not public | 3 September 2026 | |
| Singapore | Employment Pass | SGD 5,600 a month | Any employer may apply | 3 September 2026 |
Occupation families
Standard going rates from the GOV.UK going-rates table, updated 22 July 2025. The employer picks the code on the certificate of sponsorship, so ask which one they would use before relying on a figure. These ten are the families JLocate maps titles to; every eligible occupation code and its rate is on one page.
| Family | SOC code | Eligible for new applicants | Standard going rate | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Software developer | 2134 | Yes | £54,700 | Most developer and engineer titles map here. The employer picks the code on the Certificate of Sponsorship. |
| Web developer | 2134 | Yes | £54,700 | Usually sponsored under 2134. Design-led roles are sometimes coded as 2141 Web design professionals (going rate £43,800) instead. |
| Data engineer | 2133 | Yes | £54,900 | GOV.UK lists data engineers by name under 2133. Some employers still use 2134 (£54,700), so confirm the code. |
| Data scientist or statistician | 2433 | Yes | £55,100 | GOV.UK lists statistical data scientists under 2433, which is in Table 1 and open to anyone applying now. A job advertised as a data analyst is usually 3544 instead, so ask which code the employer would put on the certificate of sponsorship. |
| Data analyst | 3544 | Yes | £34,900 | A medium-skilled code in Table 1a of Appendix Skilled Occupations, open to new applicants only through the Temporary Shortage List: the certificate of sponsorship has to be issued before 31 December 2026. Work that is genuinely statistical may be coded 2433 instead, at a going rate of £55,100 and with no end date. |
| DevOps, cloud or platform | 2139 | Yes | £52,300 | GOV.UK lists DevOps engineers by name under 2139. Other cloud and platform titles are coded inconsistently, so confirm the code with the employer. |
| QA or test | 2136 | Yes | £41,200 | Testing roles map to 2136, whose going rate sits just under the £41,700 general threshold. |
| Cyber security | 2135 | Yes | £48,500 | Security roles map to 2135. |
| Product or technical project | 2133 | Yes | £54,900 | Product roles are coded in several ways. JLocate uses 2133 (IT business analysts, architects and systems designers); the employer decides. |
| AI or machine learning | 2134 | Yes | £54,700 | Applied AI roles usually sit with 2134. Research roles may use a different code. |
| IT or software support | 3132 | Yes | £33,400 | A medium-skilled code, open to new applicants only through the Temporary Shortage List: the certificate of sponsorship has to be issued before 31 December 2026 (Appendix Skilled Worker, SW 6.1A). After that it closes. |
Example sponsor snapshot
11 fictional entities, updated 1 September 2026. None of them are real licensed sponsors, and they are used only for the worked examples. A vacancy you paste is checked against a copy of the real Home Office register instead, taken when the site was built. The Dutch register is published by the IND and is not copied here.
- Northstar Systems Ltd
- Harbor Labs Limited
- Meridian Cloud Services Ltd
- Cedar Digital Ltd
- Vertex Studios Group plc
- Larkspur Analytics Ltd
- Tidewater Software Limited
- Orchard Fintech Ltd
- Kanaal Software B.V.
- Windmill Data B.V.
- Noordzee Robotics B.V.
Corrections
- : the guides on asking for sponsorship and on applying from outside the UK now cite the Home Office guidance for sponsors on the skills charge (a current Student visa is exempt, a Graduate visa is not); pages that said job checks match fictional employers now say a pasted vacancy is checked against the real register; every Temporary Shortage List mention gives its 31 December 2026 end date; and the guide on applying from outside the UK adds the tuberculosis test rule.
- : guides first published.
Found a figure that is out of date? Open an issue on the project’s GitHub page with the official source that disagrees.
Official sources
- Skilled Worker visa: overview
- Skilled Worker visa: your job and salary
- Skilled Worker visa: when you can be paid less
- Skilled Worker visa: eligible occupations and codes
- Skilled Worker visa: going rates for eligible occupation codes
- Skilled Worker visa: knowledge of English
- Immigration Rules: Appendix Skilled Worker
- Register of licensed sponsors: workers
Integrations
Each seam has a local implementation so the app runs with no keys. Set the environment variable named in .env.example and replace the provider object in src/providers.ts.
Rule snapshot Local
Thresholds and occupation mappings live in src/data/rules.ts. Last updated 15 September 2026.
Sponsor register copy Local
The GOV.UK register of licensed sponsors, copied when the site is built (scripts/register.mjs) and loaded only when a pasted vacancy or a search needs it. The demo vacancies use 11 fictional entities instead.
Demo vacancies Local
26 fictional vacancies bundled with the app, plus anything you paste. Last updated 1 September 2026.
Deterministic text cues Local
Regular expressions over the pasted text, always followed by manual review.
Accounts Live
Optional. Signed out, everything stays in this browser. Signed in, the profile, pasted jobs and saved roles are kept by the JLocate API (cms/, Payload CMS) under the account, reached at /api on this origin.
No-op event logger Local
Named events fire here and go nowhere. Wiring a provider changes the privacy notice first (see PRIVACY.md).
Terms used
- Sponsor licence
- Permission an employer holds from the Home Office to sponsor workers. It shows the organisation can sponsor, not that it will sponsor a given role.
- Occupation code
- The Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) code the employer records on the Certificate of Sponsorship. It decides eligibility and the going rate.
- Going rate
- The salary floor for an occupation code. A job must pay the general threshold or the going rate, whichever is higher.
- New entrant
- A lower salary rate, 70% of the going rate and at least £33,400, if you are under 26, on a Student visa at bachelor’s level or above or a Graduate visa now or in the last two years, or working towards a recognised qualification, registration or chartered status in the job. Limited to four years in total, Graduate visa time included.
Colophon
Set in the system sans and monospace of whatever device you are on, so no font request leaves your browser. Cool white ground, charcoal for the moments that matter, one lime action colour and blue for the labels; every other colour on this product means a verdict. Built with React and Vite, no UI kit.