{"id":4146,"date":"2018-03-24T16:13:06","date_gmt":"2018-03-24T16:13:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/glossary\/what-is-income-tax\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T11:38:47","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T11:38:47","slug":"what-is-income-tax","status":"publish","type":"sage_glossary","link":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/glossary\/what-is-income-tax\/","title":{"rendered":"What is income tax?"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class=\"entry-header has-dark-background-color entry-header--has-illustration entry-header--has-illustration--generic\">\n\t<div class=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"entry-header__row row align-center\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"col col-lg-7 col-xlg-6 entry-header__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"component component-single-header\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"entry-header__misc text--subtitle text--uppercase text--small\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/glossary\/\" class=\"entry-header__link\">Glossary definition<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"entry-title-wrapper\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h1 class=\"entry-title\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\tWhat is income tax?\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n\t<div class=\"single-post-details container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"col\">\n\t\t\t<span class=\"reading-time\"> min read<\/span>\n\t\t<button\n\t\t\ttype=\"button\"\n\t\t\tclass=\"social-share-button button button--icon button--secondary js-social-share-button\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-title=\"What is income tax?\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-url=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/glossary\/what-is-income-tax\/\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-text=\"Please read this interesting article\"\n\t\t>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__share-label\">Share<\/span>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__copy-label\" hidden>Copy Link<\/span>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__copy-tooltip\" aria-hidden=\"true\" hidden>Copied<\/span>\n\t\t<\/button>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/header>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/how-do-you-make-income-tax-return-fun\/\">Income tax<\/a> is the tax an individual pays on their income \u2013 regardless of whether they earned the income or not. This includes your salary, profits if you\u2019re self-employed, income on your savings, and tax on most <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/free-guide-to-auto-enrolment-and-workplace-pensions\/\">pensions<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Most people get a personal allowance, which gives them a certain level of income that is exempt from tax. You\u2019ll pay tax on any income above this level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Income tax is the tax an individual pays on their income \u2013 regardless of whether they earned the income or not. This includes your salary, profits if you\u2019re self-employed, income on your savings, and tax on most pensions. Most people get a personal allowance, which gives them a certain level of income that is exempt [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":274,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"_sage_video":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[37,27],"class_list":["post-4146","sage_glossary","type-sage_glossary","status-publish","hentry","tag-payroll","tag-tax"],"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"Sage Advice UK","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/sage_glossary\/4146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/sage_glossary"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/sage_glossary"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/sage_glossary\/4146\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}