Tuition Fee vs Maintenance Loan Calculator
Understand how tuition fee loans and maintenance loans combine to form your total student debt, and see the breakdown of what each component costs over time.
Combined Repayment
Tuition and maintenance loans are combined into one balance. You make a single repayment based on your income, not the amount owed.
2026-27 threshold £25,000, 9% above it, written off after 40 years[source].
Paid directly to your university by SLC. 2026-27 caps[source]. A Scottish student at a Scottish university borrows nothing for fees — SAAS pays them.
Paid directly to you in three instalments a year. These are the 2026-27 maximums and the guaranteed minimum; the maintenance loan calculator works out your own means-tested figure.
UK median graduate starting salary: ~£25,000-£30,000
Outcome: written off
Written off
£163,427 cancelled in April 2070
You would repay £34,880 of it first — 18% of everything that ever falls due. Split pro rata that is £77,592 of tuition and £85,835 of maintenance.
Loan breakdown analysis
Tuition fee loan
£29,370
47.5% of what you borrow
Maintenance loan
£32,490
52.5% of what you borrow
Total borrowed
£61,860
Over 3 years
One combined loan
Although tuition fee loans and maintenance loans serve different purposes, they're combined into a single student loan balance. You make one repayment of £22 a month (9% of income above £27,061 in 2030-31) regardless of the split between tuition and maintenance.
How this is worked out
(£30,000 − £27,061) × 9% ÷ 12 = £22.04
Plan 5, 2030-31, your first repayment year.
On these salary assumptions you will not fully repay before write-off in April 2070. You would pay about £34,880 over 40 years, leaving £163,427 to be written off — worth about £44,513 in today's money.
Lifetime cost, split pro rata
SLC holds one balance and does not track which part is which. The split below applies the proportions the two parts had reached by April 2030, when repayments begin.
| Component | Borrowed | Interest | You repay | Written off |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tuition fee | £29,370 | £64,782 | £16,560 | £77,592 |
| Maintenance | £32,490 | £71,664 | £18,319 | £85,835 |
| Total | £61,860 | £136,447 | £34,880 | £163,427 |
Every row balances: what you borrow plus the interest charged on it is either repaid or written off. Interest includes £4,334 charged before you graduate, while you are still studying[source].
Rates, assumptions and sources
Every figure below is the 2026-27 published figure, read from this site's single source of truth at page-render time[source]. The 6% Plan 2 and Postgraduate interest cap covers the 2026/27 year only and is not assumed to continue[source].
| Plan | Threshold | Rate | Interest | Written off | Threshold freeze |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plan 5 | £25,000[source] | 9% | 4.1%[source] | 40 years[source] | Frozen at £25,000 until April 2027 |
Write-off is counted from the April after the course ends, not from the course-end date itself, and the Plan 2 interest bands (£29,385 lower, £52,885 upper) are frozen alongside the Plan 2 repayment threshold.
This calculator also assumes
- Salary growth
- 2.5% a year (your input)
- Threshold uprating after a freeze ends
- 2.0% a year (assumption)
- RPI after the published rate period
- 3.0% (assumption)
- Interest while studying
- RPI only
- Draw-down
- Each year's borrowing at the midpoint of that academic year
- Repayments start
- April 2030
- Tuition and maintenance split
- Pro rata — SLC holds a single balance
Growth, inflation and long-run interest figures are assumptions, not published rates. Change them and the projection changes.
Tuition fee loan
- •Purpose: covers course fees
- •Payment: paid directly to your university
- •Amount: up to £9,790 a year (England and Wales, 2026-27)
- •Total: £29,370 over 3 years
- •Share of borrowing: 47.5%
Maintenance loan
- •Purpose: covers living costs
- •Payment: paid directly to you, in three instalments
- •Amount: £4,013 to £14,135 a year, means-tested (2026-27)
- •Total: £32,490 over 3 years
- •Share of borrowing: 52.5%
Related Calculators
Understanding Tuition Fee vs Maintenance Loans
UK students can access two types of student loans: tuition fee loans to cover course costs and maintenance loans for living expenses. While these loans serve different purposes and are paid to different recipients, they're combined into a single debt with one monthly repayment.
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