Check your rolling turnover against the VAT threshold THRESHOLD
Paste your VAT taxable turnover a month at a time. Each month gets its rolling twelve-month total, and the first month over the threshold gives the date to register by and the date VAT starts.
The months
One amount a line, in order, from the first month. A line can start with its month, as Apr 2025 7,040 or 2025-04 7040, which is how two columns pasted from a spreadsheet arrive; the months must then follow on without a gap. A month with no sales is 0, not an empty line.
The result
What it does, and what it does not
At the end of every month it adds up the twelve months to that day and compares the total with the threshold in force on that day. Going over means more than the threshold: a total of exactly £90,000 is not over. HMRC’s rule is that you must register within 30 days of the end of the month in which the total went over, and that registration takes effect from the first day of the second month after it. Over at the end of March means registering by 30 April, and charging VAT from 1 May.
Taxable turnover is everything you sell that is not exempt from VAT or outside its scope: standard-rated, reduced-rated and zero-rated sales all count, even though zero-rated ones carry no VAT. Exempt sales, such as most residential rent, do not. Until twelve months are typed in, a month is marked as not yet known unless the box says the business began in the first month, in which case the months before it count as nothing.
There is a second test this page cannot run for you: if you expect the turnover of the next 30 days alone to go over the threshold, you must register by the end of those 30 days, and VAT starts from the day you realised. A single large contract can do that. HMRC can also agree not to register a business that went over only for a moment, if it can show turnover in the next twelve months will be no more than the deregistration threshold, £88,000. Registering when you do not have to is allowed too.
It does not register you for VAT, decide whether a particular sale is taxable, exempt or zero-rated, or cover the rules for businesses based outside the UK, which have no threshold at all. It does not account for turnover from a business you took over as a going concern. For the VAT on an invoice, VAT works it out with the rounding shown.
HMRC’s figures used here
| Figure | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Registration threshold, from 1 April 2024 | £90,000 in any 12 months | GOV.UK, VAT registration |
| Registration threshold, 1 April 2017 to 31 March 2024 | £85,000 | GOV.UK, VAT registration |
| Deregistration threshold, from 1 April 2024 | £88,000 (£83,000 before) | GOV.UK, VAT registration |
| Register within | 30 days of the end of the month the total went over | GOV.UK, Register for VAT |
| VAT starts | The first day of the second month after that month | GOV.UK, Register for VAT |
Last reviewed on 6 October 2026. The threshold is set by the government and has changed before: check GOV.UK for the figure in force. A month that ended before 1 April 2017 is not tested here. This is arithmetic, not tax advice.
How it works
The test HMRC applies is not the tax year or your accounting year: it is any run of twelve months, looked at again at the end of every month. A business that grows steadily can go over in a month it never noticed. The threshold is £90,000 from 1 April 2024. Nothing typed here leaves this tab.
Doing this often? OBSCURA Books keeps the sales this turnover comes from, and once the business is registered works out its VAT return each quarter, on invoices or on cash. On its own, US$2 a month; with everything else, US$5 a month or US$48 a year. 7 days free.