New Entrant Skilled Worker Visa Application Guidance

When applying for a UK Skilled Worker Visa, an applicant who qualifies as a ‘new entrant’ to the job market can benefit from a significantly discounted salary requirement. New entrants only require a salary of 70% of their job’s standard going rate or the new entrant salary threshold of £33,400 per year (£25,000 for Health and Care roles), whichever is higher. Apart from the lower salary requirement, there is no difference between a normal Skilled Worker visa and a new entrant Skilled Worker visa. It is the same visa route with the same rights, conditions, and route to ILR.

Understanding whether you qualify can make a significant difference to your visa application, particularly if you are early in your career or switching from a Graduate visa. The reduced salary requirement makes the Skilled Worker route more accessible, but the 4-year limit requires forward planning if you intend to remain in the UK and apply for settlement.  

Who qualifies as a Skilled Worker visa new entrant?

You may qualify as a Skilled Worker visa ‘new entrant’ if you meet any of the following criteria:

• You are under 26 years old on the date your Certificate of Sponsorship (CoS) is assigned. This is the most straightforward route. Your age is calculated on the day your sponsor assigns your CoS, not when you submit your application or when the Home Office makes a decision
• You are working towards a recognised qualification in a UK-regulated profession, full professional registration or chartered status in the role for which you are being sponsored, and your sponsor confirms this on your CoS. The professional body must be listed as a regulator in the UK, and you must be actively working towards the qualification as part of your sponsored employment
• You are sponsored in a postdoctoral position within higher education. This applies specifically to jobs in Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) codes 2119 (Natural and social science professionals not elsewhere classified) or 2311 (Higher education teaching professionals), where you’re undertaking postdoctoral research, or
• You currently hold (or last held in the last 2 years) a Graduate visa.

New entrant status can last for a maximum of 4 years. This includes any time that you already spent on a Graduate visa, any Tier 2 route, or a previous Skilled Worker visa where you benefited from new entrant rates. This matters significantly for employers. If someone applies for a Skilled Worker visa as a new entrant, they must qualify as a new entrant for the entire length of the visa they are being sponsored for. The Home Office will not grant a shorter visa than what the employer has put in the CoS to make the applicant stay within the 4-year new entrant limit.

Therefore, as an employer hiring a new entrant, you need to understand whether the applicant has previously held any visa based on new entrant status and, if so, for how long. For example, if someone has already used two years as a new entrant on a previous Skilled Worker visa, you can only sponsor them for up to two more years at the discounted rate.

After spending 4 years as a new entrant, the applicant must meet the standard (undiscounted) Skilled Worker salary requirement for any subsequent Skilled Worker visa application. At this point, they will need to be paid either the full going rate for their occupation or the general salary threshold of £41,700, whichever is higher.

New entrant minimum salary calculation for Skilled Worker visa

To calculate the minimum salary that a new entrant needs to meet, follow these general steps:

1. Check whether your job can be sponsored and find your job’s going rate
2. Apply the 70% discount to your job’s going rate
3. Compare that figure with the new entrant salary threshold of £33,400 (or £25,000 if your job is in Health and Care roles)
4. The higher figure is the minimum salary you must be paid as a new entrant to apply for a Skilled Worker visa

When you calculate the minimum salary, there are a few important things to bear in mind:

• You can find whether your job can be sponsored and its going rate by looking at the Immigration Rules Appendix Skilled Occupations list.
• From 22^nd July 2025, only jobs at RQF Level 6 (degree level) can be sponsored, unless the role is listed on the Immigration Salary List or the Temporary Shortage List.
• The Appendix Skilled Occupations list contains several tables, and which one applies to you depends on your circumstances:
  • If you are a new Skilled Worker visa applicant applying after 22^nd July 2025, look for eligible jobs and going rates in Table 1
  • If you were granted a Skilled Worker visa before 22^nd July 2025, look for eligible jobs and going rates in Table 1a
  • If you were granted a Skilled Worker visa before 4^th April 2024 or you are applying for a Health and Care worker visa, look for eligible jobs and going rates in Table 2
• The annual going rate shown in the Immigration Rules Appendix Skilled Occupations list is based on a 37.5-hour working week. You will need to use the hourly rate to calculate your annual salary based on how many hours your job actually requires you to work. This is important because many roles require more than 37.5 hours, and your actual salary will need to be calculated accordingly.

Example: New entrant Skilled Worker visa application

Scenario:

• The applicant is 24 years old, so they qualify as a new entrant.
• Applying for a Financial Analyst position (SOC code 2422)
• Working 40 hours per week
• Certificate of Sponsorship was assigned after 22^nd July 2025

Step 1 – Find the going rate for SOC 2422

From Table 1 of Immigration Rules Appendix Skilled Occupations, the going rate for SOC code 2422 (Finance and investment analysts and advisers) is £45,800 per year, based on a 37.5‑hour week, which is £23.49 per hour.

Step 2 – Apply the 70% discount to your job’s going rate

Discounted hourly going-rate: £23.49 × 70% = £16.44 per hour.

Step 3 – Calculate for a 40‑hour week

Because the job is for 40 hours per week rather than 37.5, you must scale the hourly rate up to find the actual annual salary: £16.44 × 40 × 52 = £34,195 per year

Step 4 – Compare prorated figure with the new entrant threshold

You then compare this pro‑rated figure with the new entrant general salary threshold £33,400. In this example, the higher figure is the pro‑rated discounted going rate, so the minimum salary is £34,195 per year for this new entrant role.

References:

GOV.UK: Skilled Worker visa: When you can be paid less

GOV.UK: Sponsor a Skilled Worker

GOV.UK: Immigration Rules Appendix Skilled Occupations