Earned settlement explained: the proposed 10-year route to ILR, and where it stands in October 2026

If you are on a Skilled Worker visa and quietly counting down to year five, you have probably heard the phrase “earned settlement” and wondered whether your countdown just doubled. The short answer, as of 27 October 2026: the government has proposed a 10-year baseline for settlement, but it has not yet published its final decisions or the rules that would bring them in. The current rules on GOV.UK still say Skilled Workers can apply for indefinite leave to remain (ILR) after five years.

This article explains what was proposed, what has actually happened since, and what it sensibly means for a tech worker on a sponsored visa today.

The rule today

The Skilled Worker page on GOV.UK says the visa can last up to five years before you need to extend it, that you can extend as many times as you like, and that after five years you may be able to apply to settle permanently (ILR), provided you meet the other requirements. That is the rule in force while this article is being written.

Everything below is about proposed changes. Until they are written into the Immigration Rules, the five-year route is the one on the statute book.

Where earned settlement came from

The idea first appeared in the May 2025 immigration white paper, Restoring control over the immigration system. The House of Commons Library’s briefing on changes since that white paper (CBP-10267, published 21 September 2026) traces how it developed.

The Home Office then published a statement and consultation, A fairer pathway to settlement. According to GOV.UK, the consultation opened on 20 November 2025, and the Home Office’s answer to a written parliamentary question says it ran until 12 February 2026 and received more than 200,000 responses.

The government’s case, set out in the consultation document, is about scale. It forecast that around 1.6 million people could become eligible to settle between 2026 and 2030, with the number peaking at roughly 450,000 in 2028, largely because of the large number of work and care visas granted in recent years.

What was proposed

The consultation moves away from one fixed qualifying period per route. Instead it proposes a baseline that is adjusted up or down according to your “contribution” and conduct. The Commons Library summarises the main proposals as follows.

Minimum requirements for everyone

To settle at all, the proposal is that you would need:

no criminal convictions;
earnings above £12,570 a year for a sustained period (the briefing describes this as three to five years); and
English at B2 level, which is higher than the level many routes ask for today.

The baseline: 10 years

The default qualifying period would be 10 years, double today’s five years for Skilled Workers. The consultation also floated a longer 15-year baseline for people sponsored in jobs below degree level (RQF 6). That matters for some medium-skilled roles but less for most software, DevOps and cloud jobs, which tend to sit in degree-level occupation codes.

Reductions (“earning” a shorter wait)

The Commons Library lists the proposed reductions. These are the ones most relevant to tech workers:

Proposed factor	Proposed reduction	Resulting minimum (from a 10-year baseline)
Taxable income above £125,140	7 years	3 years
Higher-skilled job with income above £50,270	5 years	5 years
Public sector roles in health or teaching	5 years	5 years
Partner of a British citizen, or Hong Kong BN(O)	5 years	5 years
Volunteering / community contribution	3 to 5 years	5 to 7 years

The three income figures are familiar ones. According to GOV.UK’s income tax rates page, £12,570 is the standard Personal Allowance, £50,270 is the top of the basic-rate band, and income over £125,140 is taxed at the additional rate. Those bands apply outside Scotland, which has its own. Under the proposal, a DevOps or cloud engineer earning above £50,270 in a higher-skilled role could, in principle, settle at around five years, which is close to today’s position. Someone earning less, or in a role that does not count as higher-skilled, would face a much longer wait.

Increases (penalties)

The proposals also add time. The briefing describes:

5 to 10 extra years for having claimed public funds (benefits); and
up to 20 extra years for illegal entry or overstaying.

In total, the proposed range runs from 3 years at the fastest to 30 years at the slowest. Low and medium-skilled workers would start from a 15-year baseline, and refugees from 20 years.

Dependants and benefits after settlement

Two further points matter for families:

Dependants (partners and children) would need to meet the requirements in their own right rather than settling automatically alongside the main applicant.
The consultation proposed that people who settle could have no recourse to public funds for a period after settlement, instead of gaining access to benefits on the day ILR is granted.

Who would be affected

The consultation proposed applying the new framework to everyone who does not yet have ILR, not only new arrivals. That is the part that has worried people already several years into a Skilled Worker visa.

The EU Settlement Scheme is out of scope. Holders of settled or pre-settled status under that scheme are not covered by these proposals.

What has happened since the consultation closed

This is where most online commentary goes wrong. Here is what is actually on the record:

No final policy has been published. The Commons Library briefing records that on 15 September 2026 the Home Secretary said final decisions would come “very soon” and the policy would be published “later this year”.
No date for the formal response. In a written answer on 21 October 2026, the Home Office said it was “unable to commit to when we will respond” to the consultation.
Transitional arrangements are not decided. The same answer says no final decision has been made on how people already in the UK will be treated. The one transitional point that has been confirmed applies to refugees: according to the Commons Library, people who claimed asylum by 1 March 2026 keep the five-year route.
The answer also notes the scale of the system: almost 70 immigration routes, around 40 of which lead to settlement.

How the change would be made

Settlement rules sit in the Immigration Rules, which are changed by a statement of changes laid before Parliament. The Commons Library explains that these take effect without a positive vote. Parliament has a 40-day period in which either House can object, but changes normally go ahead. So when the government decides, implementation could follow quickly.

Other confirmed changes that affect settlement plans

Earned settlement is the headline, but several changes on the Commons Library’s list are already confirmed and will shape a tech worker’s path to ILR:

B2 English for new Skilled Worker applicants has applied since 8 January 2026 (as well as for Scale-up and High Potential Individual applicants).
A higher English standard for ILR on various routes is due from 26 March 2027.
The Graduate visa will be 18 months long for applications made from 1 January 2027 (36 months for PhD graduates). That shortens the window to find a sponsor after university.
The skilled occupation list was cut on 22 July 2025, and the immigration skills charge paid by sponsors rose on 16 December 2025.

What this means for you

None of this is personal advice, and your own situation may differ. But some practical points follow from the facts above.

1. Do not assume either outcome. Nobody outside government knows whether people already on the five-year route will be protected, partly protected or moved to the new system. Plan for more than one scenario.

2. Know your actual qualifying date. Work out from your own documents when you would reach five years of continuous residence under the current rules. If transitional protection is offered, it may depend on dates like that. You can check the current ILR requirements on GOV.UK.

3. Keep clean, complete records now. Every proposed reduction depends on evidence: taxable income (P60s, payslips, HMRC records), your job and occupation code, and any volunteering. If income bands end up mattering, a tidy HMRC record will matter too.

4. Watch the income lines. If the £50,270 higher-skilled reduction survives into the final rules, it will matter to people near that line. Remember that the Skilled Worker salary rules are separate and set by your occupation code’s “going rate”. We cover those in our DevOps and cloud salary comparison.

5. Treat the English requirement as a near-certainty. B2 is already in force for new Skilled Worker applicants, and a higher ILR English standard is scheduled. If you have not yet taken an approved test at the level you may need, that is something you can prepare for now.

6. Be careful with public funds. Most Skilled Worker visa holders cannot claim most benefits anyway, but the proposal to add years for benefit claims shows how seriously this will be treated. If you are unsure whether something counts as public funds, check GOV.UK or ask a regulated adviser before you claim it.

7. Ignore anyone selling certainty. If a consultant tells you exactly how the transition will work, ask them for the source. As of today there isn’t one.

What to watch for next

The Home Office consultation response on GOV.UK.
A statement of changes to the Immigration Rules containing the new settlement appendices.
Any announcement on transitional arrangements for people already on five-year routes.

We will update this page when any of these is published. If your plans depend on the outcome, consider getting advice from a regulated immigration adviser once the final rules are out.