Student loan forecasts - earnings
Financial year 2025-26

This document describes the data included in the ‘Student loan forecasts for England – earnings and repayments’ ad hoc statistical release’s underlying data files.



This release provides analysis on the relationship between borrower earnings and loan repayments.  This includes analysis surrounding earnings required to reduce student loan balances, proportion of borrowers forecasted to fully repay their student loan within set income bands and illustrative borrower earnings pathways.

The forecasts are based on the Department for Education (DfE) core student loan forecast repayments model. Details of the methodology can be found in the Student Loan Forecasts for England publication ( Release home - Student loan forecasts for England - Explore education statistics - GOV.UK). (https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/student-loan-forecasts-for-england/2025-26)

Data files

Borrower numbers per plan type

Filename: borrower_numbers.csv
Geographic levels: National
Time period: 2016-17 to 2025-26
Content summary: The total number of borrowers at the end of each financial year since financial year 2016-17. Student Finance England Higher Education loans to England and EU domiciled students.

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable name                  |  Variable description
-----------------------------  |  ----------------------------------------------------------------
continuing_borrowers_fy_start  |  Number of borrowers at start of FY
dropped_off_borrowers          |  Number of borrowers with loans fully repaid or written off in FY
new_borrowers                  |  Number of new borrowers in FY
plan_type                      |  Plan type of loan - Filter by plan type
total_borrowers_at_fy_end      |  Number of borrowers at end of FY

Footnotes:

1. Borrower numbers are rounded to the nearest hundred.
2. Borrowers may appear in the plan breakdown more than once if they have a product on more than one plan; the total number of borrowers by plan type will not match the total number of unique borrowers.
3. Coverage: Student Finance England ICR Higher Education Income Contingent Repayment loans to England and England EU domiciled students since Financial Year 2016-17. Advanced Learner loans are not included in this analysis.


Monthly repayments by plan type & annual earnings

Filename: table_of_monthly_repayments.csv
Geographic levels: National
Time period: 2026-27
Content summary: Monthly repayments by annual earnings for each student loan plan type for the financial year 2026-27.

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable name           |  Variable description
----------------------  |  --------------------------------------------------
annual_earnings(£)      |  Annual earnings - Filter by annual earnings amount
monthly_repayments(£)   |  Monthly repayments
plan_type               |  Plan type of loan - Filter by plan type
repayment_threshold(£)  |  Repayment threshold

Footnotes:

1. Repayment calculations based on repayment rules in financial year 2026-27


Proportion forecast to fully repay

Filename: 20260804_perc_repaying_newbands.csv
Geographic levels: National
Time period: 2022/23 to 2025/26
Content summary: Proportion of Plan 2 and Plan 5 borrowers forecast to fully repay based on earnings 3, 5 and 10 years after SRDD.

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable name    |  Variable description
---------------  |  --------------------------------------------
earn_band        |  Earnings band - Filter by earnings band
perc_repaying    |  Percentage forecast to fully repay
plan_type        |  Plan type of loan - Filter by plan type
years_post_srdd  |  Years after SRDD - Filter by years post SRDD

Footnotes:

1. Coverage: Borrowers who receive undergraduate loans through Student Finance England. For further details on eligibility, please see the Student Finance England practitioner website:  Link to practitioner products section on the SLC website (https://www.practitioners.slc.co.uk/products). Filtered further as described in this publication.
2. A summary timeline of the introduction of different plan types is available in Table 1.1 in the publication Methodology:  Link to student loan forecasts for England methodology (https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/methodology/student-loan-forecasts-for-england-methodology)
3. Full repayment is defined as a borrower paying off their loan in full, including interest, excluding any write offs due to reaching the end of their repayment period or other reasons. A borrower’s repayment period is linked to their plan type. For Plan 2 borrowers, the repayment period is 30 years. For Plan 5 borrowers, the repayment period is 40 years.
4. Proportions have been rounded to the nearest 1%.
5. Proportions of borrowers within each earnings band vary considerably, with greater model noise in bands with fewer borrowers. Some bands are wider than others to maintain forecast robustness.
6. Future repayment forecasts are sensitive to economic projections. Inflation and earnings growth projections use the OBR publication  Economic and fiscal outlook – March 2026 - Office for Budget Responsibility (https://obr.uk/efo/economic-and-fiscal-outlook-march-2026/).
