What is Making Tax Digital for Income Tax?
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax (MTD for IT) is a new way of reporting your self-employment or property income to HMRC. Instead of one Self Assessment return a year, you keep digital records and send HMRC a short update every quarter.
Who has to do it
MTD for Income Tax applies if your qualifying income from self-employment and/or property is over a threshold set by HMRC, phased in over several years:
- From April 2026: income over £50,000
- From April 2027: income over £30,000
- From April 2028: income over £20,000
Check exactly where you stand with our free scope checker.
What actually changes
- Digital records. You keep a running record of income and expenses digitally, a spreadsheet on its own isn’t enough unless it’s linked to compatible software (this is called “bridging”).
- Quarterly updates. Four times a year, you send HMRC a summary of income and expenses for that quarter. See exact dates on our deadline calculator.
- Final declaration. At the end of the tax year, you confirm your figures and any other income, much like today’s Self Assessment (this part isn’t changing for a while yet).
Why HMRC is doing this
HMRC’s own research found that better record-keeping habits, spread across the year, lead to fewer errors than one rushed return in January. The quarterly cadence is meant to make tax something you deal with a little at a time, not once a year in a panic.
What this doesn’t mean
MTD for Income Tax doesn’t change how much tax you owe, and a quarterly update is not a tax bill, it’s a running total. Nothing is due at the point you submit it.