VAT Return Calculator

A VAT return is a comparison of two totals. Output VAT is the tax you charge on your sales, collected from customers and owed to HMRC. Input VAT is the tax you pay on your purchases, which you reclaim. Subtract input from output and the difference is what you send to HMRC, or, where purchases carried more VAT than sales did, what HMRC sends back to you. For most trading businesses the figure is a modest positive number. Capital-intensive businesses in a growth phase often reclaim more than they charge, because the spending comes before the sales.

Enter your sales and purchase figures and the calculator applies the official UK rules for the 2026/27 financial year, using data taken from government publications, then shows the amount due or the refund owed. Everything is processed in your browser, with nothing sent to a server, so you can rework the numbers as often as you like and watch the result update as you type.

The standard VAT period is 3 months, so most businesses file quarterly. A return falls due 1 calendar month and 7 days after the period ends, which means a quarter closing on 31 March must be filed and paid by 7 May. Payment is made electronically, and a Direct Debit buys 3 extra days. The Annual Accounting Scheme replaces that rhythm with a single return supported by 9 interim payments. Cash Accounting, open to businesses with turnover under £1.35m, delays the VAT until your customer has actually paid you.

Choosing the right scheme is worth revisiting as turnover grows. Standard accounting suits most businesses. Cash Accounting helps where customers pay slowly. Annual Accounting smooths cash flow across the year. The Flat Rate Scheme replaces the input-against-output calculation with a flat percentage of gross turnover, set by sector between 4 and 16.5%, though a business whose goods cost less than 2% of turnover counts as a Limited Cost Trader and pays 16.5%. Margin schemes exist for second-hand goods, antiques and art, and tour operators have a margin scheme of their own.

Making Tax Digital has governed VAT filing since 2019 and was extended in 2022. Returns must reach HMRC through MTD-compatible software such as Xero, QuickBooks, Sage, FreeAgent or Zoho, with the digital records transferring by API rather than being retyped at the last minute. Manual spreadsheet uploads were banned in April 2021, although bridging software lets you keep working in a spreadsheet and submit from it. From April 2026 the same regime reaches Self Assessment for sole traders and landlords with qualifying income over £50,000, dropping to £30,000 in April 2027 and £20,000 in April 2028.

Record-keeping follows the same digital logic. You need a VAT account, sales invoices showing the VAT split, purchase invoices, credit notes, records of exempt supplies, any partial exemption calculations and capital goods scheme records, all held in a form the software can read. Keep them for 6 years, or 10 years if you use MOSS or OSS for cross-border digital sales. HMRC can ask to see any of it during that window, which is the practical reason the software route replaced the shoebox of receipts.