UK Crypto Tax Guide 2026 — HMRC Rules, CGT at 18%/24% and Section 104 Pooling

Quick answer. Cryptoassets are chargeable assets for Capital Gains Tax, not a separate category with their own rate. Selling, swapping one token for another, spending crypto, and giving it away are all disposals. Gains above the £3,000 annual exempt amount are taxed at 18% within your basic rate band and 24% above it. Mining, staking, lending and airdrops given in return for a service are income instead, taxed before CGT ever comes into it.

Note on the date in this URL (30 July 2026). The address of this page still carries "2025" because changing a live URL breaks every link to it. The content covers the 2026/27 tax year, which runs from 6 April 2026 to 5 April 2027, with the earlier rate periods set out below so you can work out a prior year if you need to.

Crypto is a chargeable asset, not a special case

HMRC does not tax "crypto". It taxes disposals of assets, and cryptoasset tokens are assets. That distinction matters, because it means there is no crypto-specific rate, no crypto-specific allowance and no crypto-specific return — the general Capital Gains Tax machinery applies, and crypto gains sit alongside gains on shares or a second property in the same calculation.

You make a disposal when you:

• sell tokens for pounds
• exchange them for a different type of cryptoasset
• use them to pay for goods or services
• give them to another person, unless it is a gift to your spouse, civil partner or a charity

The second of those is the one people miss. Swapping ether for solana is a disposal of the ether at its sterling market value on the day, even though no pounds moved and nothing reached your bank account. A year of active trading between tokens can generate a substantial tax bill with no cash anywhere in sight to pay it.

Rates and the annual exempt amount

There has never been a separate rate for cryptoassets. What changed on 30 October 2024 was the main CGT rate for individuals, and crypto followed it:

Which of the two rates you pay is worked out in this order:

1. Take your taxable income — income minus your Personal Allowance and any Income Tax reliefs.
2. Total your gains for the year and deduct the £3,000 annual exempt amount.
3. Stack what is left on top of your taxable income.
4. Anything sitting inside the basic Income Tax band — £37,700 of taxable income for 2026/27 — is charged at 18%. Anything above it is charged at 24%.

You only pay at all if your overall gains for the year, after losses and reliefs, exceed £3,000. Losses on other assets can be set against crypto gains, but you have to report them to HMRC first.

Section 104 pooling: the part that decides your cost

You do not track individual coins. Under TCGA 1992 s.104, tokens that are dealt in without identifying the particular units bought or sold are pooled, so each type of token you own becomes a single asset with one running cost. Bitcoin, ether and litecoin are three pools, each with its own pooled allowable cost, and each pool rises and falls with every acquisition and disposal.

NFTs are the exception. HMRC's Cryptoassets Manual states that non-fungible tokens are separately identifiable, so they are not pooled and no matching rules are applied to them. Each one is its own asset with its own acquisition cost.

Worked example. Priya buys ether three times in 2026/27:

Her pool now holds 6 ETH at a pooled allowable cost of £13,400, so the average cost is £2,233.33 per ETH.

On 2 February 2027 she sells 4 ETH for £11,600 and pays £60 in exchange fees.

• Proceeds: £11,600
• Cost of the 4 ETH taken from the pool, at £2,233.33 each: £8,933.33
• Allowable transaction fee: £60
• Gain: £2,606.67

The pool now holds 2 ETH carrying £4,466.67 of pooled cost. That figure is the one nobody keeps and everybody needs — it is the input to every future disposal, and no exchange will calculate it for you.

Suppose she then sells the remaining 2 ETH on 1 March 2027 for £6,500. The cost is the £4,466.67 left in the pool, so the gain is £2,033.33. Her gains for 2026/27 now come to £4,640.00. Deducting the £3,000 annual exempt amount leaves £1,640 taxable, and as a higher-rate taxpayer she pays 24% of that: £393.60.

Had she stopped after the February sale, her £2,606.67 gain would have been inside the exempt amount and she would have owed nothing. The second disposal is what created the liability — which is why the pooled cost needs tracking through the year rather than reconstructing in January.

The same-day and 30-day rules

Two rules pull acquisitions out of the pool. HMRC applies them in this order for every disposal:

1. Same-day rule (TCGA 1992 s.105). Tokens of the same type bought and sold on the same day, in the same capacity, are each treated as a single transaction and matched against each other. They never touch the pool.
2. 30-day rule (TCGA 1992 s.106A). If you dispose of tokens and then acquire tokens of the same type within the next 30 days, those acquisitions are matched against the earlier disposal, earliest disposal first, instead of going into the pool.
3. Whatever is left over comes out of, or goes into, the Section 104 pool.

The 30-day rule is what stops "bed and breakfasting" — selling to bank a loss and buying straight back in.

Worked example. Tom's pool holds 1 BTC at a cost of £48,000. On 20 March 2027 he sells it for £41,000, expecting to book a £7,000 loss against his other gains. On 28 March he buys 1 BTC back for £42,000.

Because the repurchase falls inside 30 days, the March disposal is matched with the 28 March acquisition rather than with the pool: proceeds of £41,000 against a cost of £42,000, a loss of £1,000. The pool is untouched and still carries £48,000 against the coin he now holds. The other £6,000 of loss has not vanished, but it is locked in the pool until he sells without buying back inside 30 days.

What you can and cannot deduct

Allowable costs reduce the gain:

• transaction and exchange fees
• advertising for a buyer or a seller
• drawing up a contract for the transaction
• a valuation obtained so you can work out the gain
• the appropriate proportion of the pooled cost

Not allowable:

• anything already deducted against profits for Income Tax
• mining costs — equipment and electricity are explicitly excluded

When it is income, not a gain

Income Tax takes priority. If you have paid Income Tax on the value of tokens when you received them, CGT applies only to any increase in value after that point.

• Mining, staking, lending and liquidity pool rewards, including DeFi, count as other taxable income where you are not carrying on a trade. There is a £1,000 allowance each tax year for trading and miscellaneous income, and crypto income counts towards it. If your total miscellaneous income from all sources falls between £1,000 and £2,500 you contact HMRC; above £2,500 you register for Self Assessment.
• Airdrops are the case with two answers. Income Tax may not apply to tokens received in a personal capacity without doing anything in return, and outside any trade involving exchange tokens or mining. But an airdrop received in return for, or in expectation of, a service is taxable as miscellaneous income or as a receipt of an existing trade. Either way, disposing of airdropped tokens later can still produce a chargeable gain.
• Payment from an employer in cryptoassets counts as "money's worth" and attracts Income Tax and National Insurance contributions. Exchange tokens such as bitcoin are readily convertible assets, so a UK employer must put the value through PAYE before paying you, and deduct the tax from your other wages for that period.

Records HMRC expects, and how to report

You must keep, for each pool: the type of tokens, the date of each disposal, how many you disposed of, how many you have left, the value in pounds sterling, bank statements, and the pooled costs before and after the disposal. Wallet addresses are worth keeping too.

Exchange reports are not a substitute. HMRC says so directly: they are not tax calculations, and they will not track your pooled costs. Only you hold the full picture across every exchange and wallet you use.

To report, you can either complete a Self Assessment tax return — returns for 2024/25 onwards carry a dedicated cryptoasset section — or use the Capital Gains Tax real time service. For earlier years where tax went unpaid, HMRC runs a Cryptoasset Disclosure Service.

What changed for 2026

HMRC now receives your exchange data. Since 1 January 2026 you must give every cryptoasset service provider you use your full name, date of birth, the address and country where you normally live, and your tax identification number — in the UK, your National Insurance number or Unique Taxpayer Reference. Providers report that data to HMRC. Where the provider sits outside the UK, that country's tax authority passes the information on under an international exchange agreement. Giving inaccurate details, or none at all, to a UK provider carries a penalty of up to £300, and more for non-UK providers.

The practical consequence is that "HMRC will not know" stopped being true. If HMRC finds unpaid tax, the penalty can reach 100% of the tax due plus interest, and considerably more for offshore matters.

Crypto exchange traded notes moved ISA. From 6 April 2026, cryptoasset exchange traded notes cannot be held in a stocks and shares ISA unless they were already held there before that date. They belong in an innovative finance ISA instead. Gains inside any ISA stay outside CGT altogether.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Is there a special tax rate for crypto in the UK? A: No. Cryptoassets are chargeable assets and attract the ordinary Capital Gains Tax rates for individuals — 18% within the basic rate band and 24% above it, since 30 October 2024. There is no separate crypto rate and no separate crypto allowance.

Q: Do I pay tax if I swap one token for another and never cash out? A: Yes. Exchanging one type of cryptoasset for a different type is a disposal, valued in sterling on the day. This is the single biggest source of unexpected UK crypto tax bills, because the tax falls due in pounds while the proceeds are still in tokens.

Q: My gains were under £3,000. Do I need to do anything? A: If your total gains for the tax year, after losses and reliefs, fall below the annual exempt amount, there is no CGT to pay. Keep the records anyway — pooled costs carry forward, and a later disposal in the same year can push you over the threshold, as the worked example above shows.

Q: Do I owe tax on staking rewards I have not sold? A: Generally yes, but as income rather than capital. Tokens received from mining, staking or lending are taxable when received, at their sterling value, as other taxable income if you are not trading. The £1,000 trading and miscellaneous income allowance may cover a small amount. When you later sell them, CGT applies only to the growth since you received them.

Q: Can I sell at a loss in March and buy back in April to use the loss? A: Not if the repurchase falls within 30 days of the sale. Under TCGA 1992 s.106A the acquisition is matched against the earlier disposal rather than the pool, so most of the loss you expected is absorbed into the new cost instead of being available against other gains.

Q: What if I made an overall loss on crypto this year? A: Capital losses can be set against other capital gains, including gains on shares or property, but you have to report them to HMRC before you can use them. Report them even in a year with no tax to pay.

Q: Does HMRC actually know about my exchange account? A: Increasingly, yes. Since 1 January 2026 cryptoasset service providers collect your identifying details and report them to HMRC, and non-UK providers pass the same information on through their own tax authority. If you have unpaid tax from earlier years, the Cryptoasset Disclosure Service is the route to settle it before HMRC comes to you.

Sources

All figures and rules verified against gov.uk on 30 July 2026:

• Check if you need to pay tax when you sell cryptoassets — HMRC guidance, last updated 29 May 2025 (disposals, pooling, allowable costs, records, reporting)
• Check if you need to pay tax when you receive cryptoassets — HMRC guidance, last updated 28 April 2025 (mining, staking, lending, DeFi, employment income, the £1,000 allowance)
• HMRC Cryptoassets Manual — CRYPTO22200 (Section 104 pooling, the same-day rule at TCGA 1992 s.105 and the 30-day rule at s.106A, NFTs) and CRYPTO21250 (airdrops)
• Capital Gains Tax rates and allowances — HMRC, last updated 13 April 2026 (rate periods and annual exempt amounts)
• Capital Gains Tax: rates — gov.uk (the £37,700 basic rate band for 2026/27, and how the 18%/24% split is worked out)
• Information you need to give to UK cryptoasset service providers — HMRC, last updated 1 January 2026 (reporting, penalties)
• Individual Savings Accounts (ISAs): how ISAs work — gov.uk (cryptoasset exchange traded notes from 6 April 2026)