Salary · Published 2026-08-06 · Updated 2026-08-06 · 13 min read

Immigration Salary List: Who Qualifies and What Changes

Quick answer

The immigration salary list (ISL) is a list of occupations that unlock a lower salary floor on the Skilled Worker and Health and Care Worker routes. If your job is on it, the minimum salary is £33,400 a year instead of the standard £41,700 — but you must still be paid the going rate for the occupation, so the list lowers one test and not the other. A second, separate list, the temporary shortage list (TSL), covers occupations at RQF levels 3 to 5 that would otherwise be ineligible after the July 2025 skill rise; it grants access rather than a discount, allows no salary reduction, and does not permit dependants. Both the interim TSL and the expanded ISL are due to end on 31 December 2026.

Key takeaways

• ISL jobs get a £33,400 floor instead of £41,700, and must still meet the

going rate.

• The ISL replaced the old shortage occupation list; the 20% going-rate

discount that list used to give no longer exists.

• The TSL is a different thing: it restores eligibility for RQF 3–5 roles, not

a discount.

• TSL occupations cannot bring dependants and get no salary reduction.
• Both lists are scheduled to end on 31 December 2026.
• The Migration Advisory Committee's final recommendations were due in July

2026, so the picture may change before the deadline.

• Being on a list is about the job, not the person. It changes nothing about

whether an employer chooses to sponsor.

Where the lists came from

The shortage occupation list is gone

For years the shortage occupation list (SOL) was the shorthand every candidate learned: find your job on the SOL, get a discount. That framing no longer works. The immigration salary list replaced it, and the mechanics changed with the name. The old going-rate discount was removed; what remains is a lower general salary floor.

This is the single most common out-of-date belief in UK sponsorship advice. If a page tells you that a listed occupation gets 80% of the going rate, it is describing a system that no longer applies.

The July 2025 skill rise reshaped everything

On 22 July 2025 the Skilled Worker skill threshold rose to RQF level 6 — broadly degree level. GOV.UK's own explanatory memorandum records that the change meant "a reduction of around 180 eligible occupations" Source: GOV.UK — Explanatory memorandum to HC 997, 1 July 2025.

Workers already on the Skilled Worker route when the change took effect are exempt from the higher skill threshold under transitional arrangements. The same memorandum notes there are no transitional arrangements for the salary updates — a distinction worth reading twice if you are extending.

That skill rise is why the temporary shortage list exists at all.

The immigration salary list: how it works

What it does

The ISL applies to the Skilled Worker visa and the Health and Care Worker visa Source: GOV.UK — Skilled Worker visa: immigration salary list. The guidance page was last updated on 11 November 2025.

If your job is on the list, GOV.UK sets the minimum at "£33,400 per year if you are being sponsored for a job on the immigration salary list", and you must still meet the standard going rate for that job Source: GOV.UK — When you can be paid less. All salary figures on this page were verified against GOV.UK on 6 August 2026.

The two tests, and why people misread them

Sponsorship salary is always two tests, not one:

The ISL lowers the first row. It does nothing to the second. So the list helps in exactly one situation: where the occupation's going rate sits between £33,400 and £41,700, and the general floor was the thing blocking the role.

Where the going rate is already above £41,700 — most senior engineering, medical, and management codes — being on the ISL changes nothing at all, because the going rate was the binding test the whole time.

A worked example

Figures below use published going rates; the employers are invented.

Take an occupation with a standard going rate of £36,000.

• Without the ISL: the role must clear £41,700, because that is higher than

the going rate. A £36,500 offer fails.

• With the ISL: the floor drops to £33,400, and the going rate of £36,000

becomes the binding test. A £36,500 offer now works.

Now take electrical engineers, occupation code 2123, with a standard going rate of £58,700 Source: GOV.UK — Going rates for eligible occupation codes. Here the ISL is irrelevant. The going rate is the wall, and it does not move.

That is the whole logic. Check the going rate first, then ask whether the list matters.

The other lower-salary routes

The ISL is one of several ways to sit below the standard floor, and candidates often qualify under a different one without realising. GOV.UK sets these out together:

Source for the whole table: GOV.UK — When you can be paid less, verified 6 August 2026.

Note the pattern: the new entrant and PhD routes reduce the going rate itself, which the ISL does not. For a recent graduate under 26, the new-entrant route is frequently more useful than the salary list — and it depends on you rather than on the job.

The temporary shortage list: a different animal

What it is

The TSL covers occupations at RQF levels 3 to 5 that the Department for Business and Trade and HM Treasury identified as important to the UK's Modern Industrial Strategy Source: GOV.UK — Temporary shortage list: stage 1 report.

After the skill threshold rose to RQF 6, those occupations fell out of the Skilled Worker route entirely. The TSL puts a narrow set of them back in.

The crucial difference

The MAC's report is explicit on both restrictions: "There should be no salary discounts on the TSL", and the government has "ruled out dependants for Temporary Shortage List occupations".

The dependants rule is the one that changes lives, and it gets the least coverage. If you are considering a TSL occupation and you have a partner or children who would need to come with you, that restriction has to be part of the decision from day one. What that means for your own family's situation is a question for GOV.UK or a regulated adviser, not for a website.

The clock on both lists

The interim TSL and the expanded ISL both expire on 31 December 2026. The Migration Advisory Committee's final recommendations were due in July 2026, in time for implementation before the deadline. Occupations below RQF 6 currently on the ISL are due to be removed by the end of 2026 unless the MAC recommends they stay.

Practically: if you are planning around either list, plan around a December 2026 cliff edge and check GOV.UK again before you commit. This is the fastest-moving area in UK sponsorship right now, and any page you read about it — including this one — should be treated as a snapshot with a date on it.

How this fits with the rest of a sponsorship

The list is about the job, not you

A common misunderstanding: people ask how to "get on the immigration salary list". You cannot. The list contains occupations, not people. Your role either falls under a listed occupation code or it does not, and the employer's certificate of sponsorship records which code applies.

That means the leverage point, if there is one, is the occupation code on the certificate — and that has to be an accurate description of the job, not a convenient one. We explain how the code works in our guide to the certificate of sponsorship.

The list changes nothing about willingness

A listed occupation does not make an employer more likely to sponsor. The employer still pays £525 for the certificate and up to £6,600 in Immigration Skills Charge across five years for a medium or large sponsor Source: GOV.UK — Immigration skills charge. Those costs do not fall because the occupation is listed.

And the employer still needs a valid licence with an A rating to assign a new certificate. A perfect ISL occupation at a B-rated sponsor goes nowhere until the rating changes — see our guide to sponsor licence ratings. A licence is permission to sponsor; it is not a promise to sponsor any role or any person.

How to check whether your job qualifies

1. Find the likely occupation code. Use the GOV.UK eligible occupations

list and match on duties, not job title. "Product Manager" is a job title; the code is decided by what the role actually does.

1. Look up the going rate for that code. Rates are published per code and

assume a 37.5-hour week, pro-rated for other hours.

1. Compare the going rate with £41,700. If the going rate is higher, the

ISL cannot help you.

1. If the going rate is lower, check the current ISL for that code.
2. Check the other lower-salary routes — new entrant, PhD, postdoctoral —

which often apply where the ISL does not.

1. Note the date you checked, because both lists are scheduled to change by

the end of 2026.

Every one of those steps uses free, official GOV.UK pages. No paid tool has access to different figures.

What this means for your job search

For candidates in listed occupations

The realistic gain is narrow but real: roles that would have been blocked by the £41,700 floor become possible where the going rate is lower. Search accordingly, and read salary ranges in ads against the going rate rather than against the headline threshold.

For candidates in high going-rate occupations

Stop thinking about the lists. Your binding test is the going rate, and no list lowers it. Effort is better spent on which employers hold licences, at what rating, and in which routes.

For candidates considering a TSL occupation

Read the two restrictions before anything else: no salary discount, no dependants. Then read the end date. A role that works brilliantly in 2026 may have no route behind it in 2027, and planning a move without that in view is how people get caught out.

Reading the going rates table properly

Almost every mistake in this area comes from misreading the going rates page, so it is worth walking through how it is structured.

The columns

The published table gives, for each occupation code: the job type, related job titles, a standard going rate, and a lower going rate — each shown as an annual figure with an hourly equivalent Source: GOV.UK — Going rates for eligible occupation codes. That page was last updated on 22 July 2025.

The hours trap

Rates "are based on a 37.5-hour working week" and must be adjusted for different schedules. That cuts both ways. A 40-hour role needs proportionally more than the published figure; a 30-hour role needs proportionally less, but the general threshold does not shrink with it. This is why part-time sponsored roles are uncommon rather than impossible.

Reading three real codes

Verified against GOV.UK on 6 August 2026.

Look at what the lists can and cannot do here. For code 1111 and code 2123, the going rate is far above £41,700, so the ISL changes nothing. For code 5434, the standard rate is exactly at the ISL floor — which is where lists and lower-rate routes start to matter, and where the skill-level question becomes decisive instead.

Matching the code to the job

The code follows the duties, not the job title, and the certificate of sponsorship records which code the employer used. If the code on a certificate does not describe the work, the salary is being tested against the wrong benchmark. That is worth raising early rather than late.

What to watch between now and December 2026

Both lists expire on 31 December 2026, and the MAC's final recommendations were due in July 2026. That makes the rest of 2026 unusually unstable for anyone planning around either list.

A sensible watching brief:

Check the GOV.UK pages themselves rather than commentary about them, including this one. Any article about this topic — this article included — is a snapshot with a date attached, and the date matters more than usual right now.

The bottom line

The immigration salary list does one thing: it lowers the general salary floor from £41,700 to £33,400 for listed occupations, while leaving the going rate fully in place. That makes it powerful in a narrow band of roles and irrelevant in most senior ones.

The temporary shortage list is not a discount at all. It is a door held open for RQF 3–5 occupations after the July 2025 skill rise, with no salary reduction and no dependants attached.

Both are scheduled to end on 31 December 2026. Check the going rate for your occupation code first, check which lower-salary route actually applies to you second, and check GOV.UK again before you make a decision that depends on either list.

This page is information, not immigration advice. This site is not affiliated with the Home Office or GOV.UK. For your own circumstances, check GOV.UK or speak to an adviser registered with the Immigration Advice Authority or a regulated solicitor.

Sources

1. Skilled Worker visa: immigration salary list — GOV.UK
2. Skilled Worker visa: when you can be paid less — GOV.UK
3. Skilled Worker visa: your job — GOV.UK
4. Skilled Worker visa: going rates for eligible occupation codes — GOV.UK
5. Temporary shortage list: stage 1 report — GOV.UK
6. Explanatory memorandum to the statement of changes to the Immigration Rules: HC 997 — GOV.UK
7. Immigration skills charge — GOV.UK
8. Find an immigration adviser — GOV.UK

Frequently asked questions

What is the immigration salary list?

It is a GOV.UK list of occupations that qualify for a lower general salary floor on the Skilled Worker and Health and Care Worker routes. Listed jobs have a minimum of £33,400 instead of £41,700 and must still meet the going rate.

Did the immigration salary list replace the shortage occupation list?

Yes. The ISL replaced the shortage occupation list, and the 20% going-rate discount the old list offered no longer applies. Only the general floor is reduced.

How much lower is the salary threshold on the immigration salary list?

£33,400 a year instead of the standard £41,700, verified against GOV.UK on 6 August 2026. The going rate for the occupation still applies in full.

Does being on the immigration salary list reduce the going rate?

No. This is the most common misunderstanding. The list lowers the general threshold only. The occupation's going rate is unchanged.

What is the temporary shortage list?

A separate list of RQF level 3 to 5 occupations identified as important to the UK's Modern Industrial Strategy. It restores eligibility for roles that fell out of the Skilled Worker route when the skill threshold rose to RQF 6.

Can I bring my family on a temporary shortage list job?

No. The government has ruled out dependants for temporary shortage list occupations. What that means for your own circumstances is a question for GOV.UK or a regulated adviser.

Do temporary shortage list jobs get a salary discount?

No. The MAC report states there should be no salary discounts on the TSL. It grants access to the route, not a lower floor.

When do the immigration salary list and temporary shortage list end?

Both the interim temporary shortage list and the expanded immigration salary list are due to expire on 31 December 2026. The MAC's final recommendations were due in July 2026.

How do I get my job added to the immigration salary list?

Individuals cannot. The list is set through government policy on the advice of the Migration Advisory Committee, and it contains occupations rather than people or employers.

Is the immigration salary list the same for the whole UK?

The published list identifies which jobs are on it in each area of the UK, so check the entry that applies to where the job is based rather than assuming a single national list.

Does an immigration salary list job make sponsorship more likely?

No. It changes the salary test the role must pass. It does not change the employer's costs, their licence status, or their willingness to sponsor.

What if I am a recent graduate — is the list my best route?

Often not. If you are under 26 on the date you apply, or a student, recent graduate, or in professional training, the new-entrant route gives 70% of the going rate with a £33,400 floor, which is usually more generous than the ISL.

Where do I find the current immigration salary list?

On GOV.UK, in the "Skilled Worker visa: immigration salary list" publication. That page is the only authoritative version, and it carries its own last-updated date.

Does the sponsor register show which employers hire for listed occupations?

No. The register shows which organisations hold sponsor licences, their town, rating, and routes. It says nothing about occupations, vacancies, or hiring intent.

If my going rate is above £41,700, is any list relevant?

Not for the salary test. Your binding number is the going rate. Lists become relevant only when the general floor is the higher of the two.

Sources