Chartered accountant salary in the UK
ONS data for April 2025 · Page updated
Chartered and certified accountants earn well above the UK median. The biggest jumps in pay usually come at qualification and when moving from practice into industry, which is when negotiation matters most.
- Median full-time pay
- £50,062
- 25th percentile
- £38,696
- 75th percentile
- £68,056
- Change on a year earlier
- +0.6%
How pay is spread
Line: 10th to 90th percentile. Bar: the middle half of earners (25th to 75th). Mark and label: median. Where ONS doesn't publish the 90th percentile, the line stops at the highest published point.
| Full-time annual pay | Chartered accountant | All UK jobs |
|---|---|---|
| 10th percentile | £29,557 | £23,990 |
| 25th percentile | £38,696 | £29,262 |
| Median | £50,062 | £39,039 |
| 75th percentile | £68,056 | £54,009 |
| 90th percentile | – | £76,903 |
| Mean | £55,414 | £48,512 |
– ONS doesn't publish this figure because the sample is too small to be reliable.
ONS classifies this role as “Chartered and certified accountants” (SOC 2020 code 2421). Figures cover full-time employees across the whole UK, at every level of seniority, so a senior role in London or at a large employer will usually sit above the median. Pay by region for individual occupations isn't published reliably at city level.
What chartered accountants can negotiate
Newly qualified is a reset point. Qualifying with ICAEW, ACCA or CIMA changes your market rate overnight. If your employer's post-qualification raise is below what qualified roles pay, use adverts for newly qualified roles as evidence.
Practice to industry. Moving into industry often comes with a salary rise, but check the bonus, pension and progression too. Practice firms' bonus and promotion timetables are usually more predictable.
Study support. If you're still qualifying, exam fees, study leave and paid time for resits are all negotiable, and can be worth thousands.
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Other roles
Source: Office for National Statistics, Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2025 (provisional), Table 14.7a (occupation, SOC 2020). Gross annual pay for full-time employee jobs, April 2025. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. See how we use this data.