Capital Gains Tax 24/25: Rates, Allowances, and 60-Day Deadline

Capital Gains Tax for the 2024/25 tax year uses a £3,000 tax-free allowance, and the rates changed partway through: disposals completed on or after 30 October 2024 are taxed at 18% and 24% on almost all assets, while earlier disposals kept the old split between property and non-property rates. The tax year ran from 6 April 2024 to 5 April 2025, and if you need to report gains through Self Assessment the return and payment are due by 31 January 2026.1GOV.UK. Self Assessment Tax Returns Deadlines UK residential property has its own faster deadline, covered below.

The £3,000 Annual Exempt Amount

Every individual can realise £3,000 of gains in 2024/25 before any CGT is due. Most trusts get half that, £1,500.2GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax Rates and Allowances

The allowance has fallen sharply. It was £12,300 in 2022/23, dropped to £6,000 in 2023/24, and has now halved again. At £3,000, a modest share sale or a small second-property gain will push you into taxable territory, so the disposal proceeds and allowable costs matter more than they used to.

Rates for Disposals Before 30 October 2024

If your disposal completed between 6 April 2024 and 29 October 2024, the rate depends on the asset type:

  • Non-residential assets, including shares and business assets: 10% within your unused basic-rate income tax band, 20% above it.
  • Residential property: 18% at the basic rate, 24% at the higher rate. The 24% figure was itself a cut from the previous 28%, introduced by the Spring Budget 2024.3GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax Rate on Disposals of Residential Property From 6 April 2024
  • Trustees and personal representatives: 20% on non-residential gains, 24% on residential property gains.

Rates for Disposals From 30 October 2024

The Autumn Budget on 30 October 2024 aligned the non-property rates with the residential property rates. For disposals completed on or after that date and up to 5 April 2025:

  • Individuals, on almost all assets: 18% at the basic rate, 24% at the higher rate. The distinction between residential property and other assets effectively disappeared.4GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax – Rates of Tax
  • Trustees and personal representatives: 24% on all gains.2GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax Rates and Allowances
  • Carried interest: 18% at the basic rate, 28% at the higher rate for individuals.

The completion date drives which set of rates applies, not the exchange date or the tax return you file it on.

How Your Rate Is Decided

Whether you pay the basic or higher rate depends on your total taxable income for the year. HMRC stacks your chargeable gains on top of your income and looks at which band they fall into. If your income already fills the basic-rate band (£37,700 above the personal allowance), the whole gain sits in the higher band. If there is basic-rate room left, the slice of the gain that fits gets the lower rate and the rest gets the higher rate.

Business Asset Disposal Relief and Investors’ Relief

Two reliefs kept a reduced 10% rate for the whole of 2024/25, regardless of the October changes.2GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax Rates and Allowances

Business Asset Disposal Relief, formerly Entrepreneurs’ Relief, applies when you sell all or part of your business, shares in your personal trading company, or assets used by your business partnership. You need to have owned the business or held the shares for at least two years before the sale. Qualifying gains up to a £1 million lifetime limit are taxed at 10%.5GOV.UK. Business Asset Disposal Relief Eligibility

Investors’ Relief works similarly for external investors who acquired unlisted shares on or after 17 March 2016 and held them for at least three years. The lifetime limit is £10 million.6HM Revenue & Customs. Investors Relief 2024 HS308

From 6 April 2025 the rate for both reliefs rises to 14%, and to 18% from April 2026, so 2024/25 was the final year at 10%.4GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax – Rates of Tax

Deadlines: When You Must Report and Pay

UK Residential Property: 60 Days

If you sold UK residential property at a gain during 2024/25, you had to report the disposal and pay the CGT due within 60 days of the completion date, using HMRC’s online CGT on UK property service.7GOV.UK. Report and Pay Your Capital Gains Tax – If You Sold a Property in the UK on or After 6 April 2020 This is separate from Self Assessment, and the 60-day clock runs even if you later include the same gain on your annual return. Missing it triggers interest from the date the tax was due and a potential late filing penalty.

Other Assets: 31 January 2026

For non-property gains (shares, business assets, personal possessions worth more than £6,000), you can report either through Self Assessment or through HMRC’s real-time CGT service.8GOV.UK. Report and Pay Your Capital Gains Tax – If You Have Other Capital Gains to Report If you use Self Assessment, the online return for 2024/25 must be filed by 31 January 2026, and the tax owed is due on the same date.1GOV.UK. Self Assessment Tax Returns Deadlines

Penalties for Filing Late

Miss the Self Assessment deadline and the penalties escalate:

Interest runs on any unpaid tax from the original due date on top of the penalties.

Using Losses to Reduce the Bill

Losses on disposals in the same tax year are set against your gains first, even if the £3,000 allowance would have covered those gains anyway. Anything left over can be carried forward indefinitely.10GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax – Losses

Carried-forward losses behave differently: you only need to use enough of them to bring net gains down to the £3,000 annual exempt amount, not below it. You must tell HMRC about a loss within four years of the end of the tax year in which it arose, or you lose the right to claim it. Losses cannot be carried back.10GOV.UK. Capital Gains Tax – Losses

What CGT Does and Doesn’t Cover

A disposal for CGT purposes is not only a sale. It also covers giving an asset away, swapping it, or receiving compensation for it, such as an insurance payout for something destroyed. Each is a moment where you may have a taxable gain.

Several assets sit outside CGT entirely. Your main home is normally covered by Private Residence Relief, provided you lived in it as your only or main home for the whole period of ownership, did not let out part of it (a lodger is fine), did not use any part exclusively for business, and the grounds are under 5,000 square metres.11GOV.UK. Tax When You Sell Your Home Partial relief applies where only some of those conditions are met, with the final nine months of ownership always qualifying.12HM Revenue & Customs. HS283 Private Residence Relief 2025

Private cars are exempt.13GOV.UK. Personal Possessions and Capital Gains Tax 2024 HS293 Shares held inside an ISA or Personal Equity Plan can be sold free of CGT. UK Government gilts, Premium Bonds, and winnings from betting, the lottery, or other gambling are also outside the tax. Transfers between spouses or civil partners who are living together happen on a “no gain, no loss” basis, so no tax is triggered at the point of transfer; the receiving spouse takes on the original cost and any tax is settled when they later sell to someone else.14HM Revenue & Customs. HS281 Capital Gains Tax Civil Partners and Spouses 2024

Calculating the Gain

The core sum is sale price minus original purchase price minus allowable costs. Allowable costs include the fees you paid to buy and sell (solicitors, estate agents, stockbrokers), stamp duty or SDLT on the purchase, and money spent on permanent improvements that added value.15GOV.UK. Tax When You Sell Your Home – Work Out Your Gain Normal maintenance and redecoration do not count; an extension would.

Keep receipts and contracts. HMRC can open an enquiry into a return for up to four years after the filing date, longer if it suspects carelessness or fraud, and you will need the paperwork to defend your figures.