Making Tax Digital for Creators: Does It Apply to You in 2026/27?
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax became mandatory in April 2026, and HMRC says more than 864,000 sole traders and landlords are within scope. If you are a creator whose 2024/25 qualifying income exceeded £50,000, you may be one of them.
Important: the first quarterly update for 2026/27 is due by 7 August 2026.
The quick answer
You are in Making Tax Digital for Income Tax from 6 April 2026 if you are a sole trader or landlord registered for Self Assessment, and your qualifying income for the 2024/25 tax year was over £50,000.
Three things creators get wrong about this:
The threshold is measured on turnover, not profit. HMRC calls it qualifying income, and it is your total self-employment and property income before expenses. A creator with £62,000 of income and £20,000 of costs has £42,000 of profit — and £62,000 of qualifying income.
It is assessed on a past year. Your position for 2026/27 comes from your 2024/25 tax return, not this year's earnings. Whether you are having a good year now is irrelevant.
A quarterly update is not a tax return, and it does not trigger a payment. You will still submit an annual return by 31 January, and payment dates are unchanged — but once you are in MTD, that return must be completed and submitted through compatible software.
This guide covers creators operating as sole traders. Making Tax Digital for Income Tax does not currently apply to limited companies, and the timeline for partnerships has not yet been set.
Am I actually in scope?
Three conditions have to be met together. You need to be a sole trader or landlord registered for Self Assessment, you need income from self-employment or property, and your qualifying income needs to exceed the threshold for the tax year.
Qualifying income is your total income from self-employment and property, before expenses, based on the tax return you submitted for the previous year. For 2026/27, that is your 2024/25 return.
- Your self-employment turnover
- UK and foreign property income, if you were UK resident
- Turnover from more than one self-employed trade, added together
- Income sources that have since ceased, where another source continues
- Employment income through PAYE
- Dividends, including from your own company
- Your share of profit from a partnership
- State and private pensions
Counts towards qualifying incomeDoes not countYour self-employment turnoverEmployment income through PAYEUK and foreign property income, if you were UK residentDividends, including from your own companyTurnover from more than one self-employed trade, added togetherYour share of profit from a partnershipIncome sources that have since ceased, where another source continuesState and private pensions
The taxable receipts belonging to your sole-trader creator business generally form part of your self-employment turnover — brand fees, ad revenue, affiliate commission, subscriptions, course sales, merchandise. Content income received through a company, a partnership or an employment arrangement may be treated differently.
The point most likely to catch a creator: a day job does not count, but your self-employment turnover does — and it is added to any rental income you have. A creator with a £45,000 salary and £30,000 of content turnover is not in scope on the salary. A creator with £38,000 of content turnover and £14,000 of rent is at £52,000, and is in scope, assuming no exemption applies.
Two smaller points. HMRC may annualise your figure where the relevant accounting period is shorter than 12 months and it has the information to do so — for property income, you may need to annualise it yourself. And if you are on the cash basis and VAT registered, whether you include VAT in your declared income is your choice, but if you include it, it counts towards your qualifying income.
HMRC should have written to anyone it believes is in scope. Its guidance is explicit that if you did not receive a letter, it is still your responsibility to check. There is a checking tool on GOV.UK that takes a couple of minutes.
Could I be exempt?
Some people are automatically exempt, and others can apply — for example where age, health, disability, religious belief or lack of usable internet access makes using compatible software unreasonable. Being unfamiliar with software, or facing the cost of it, is not enough on its own.
If you are exempt you still report your income through a Self Assessment return in the usual way. Check HMRC's exemptions guidance or take advice rather than assuming an exemption applies.
What a quarterly update actually is
It is a digital summary of your business income and expenses, sent to HMRC through compatible software. HMRC's own description is that it takes minutes.
The part almost everyone gets wrong: updates are cumulative. Each one covers from the start of the tax year to the end of that update period — not just the latest three months. Your Q2 update in November restates 6 April to 5 October in full. This is deliberate and it works in your favour: if you find a mistake in an earlier period, the next update corrects it automatically, with nothing to resend.
What an update is not:
Not a tax return. You still submit an annual return by 31 January. Once you are using MTD, that return must be completed and submitted through your compatible software, and you add any other income and gains there too.
Not a payment. Nothing becomes due on 7 August. MTD does not change how or when you pay.
Not final. Accounting and tax adjustments are dealt with at the end of the year, not in the quarterly update.
Not something you can file through your HMRC online account. It has to go through recognised software. A spreadsheet alone will not do it, though bridging software can connect one.
Two things worth knowing. If you had no income and no expenses in a period, you still have to send the update to tell HMRC that. And you can send updates more often than quarterly if you want a clearer running picture — each one still covers the full cumulative period.
One genuine upside: after each update, you can see an estimated tax bill through your software or HMRC online services, incorporating information HMRC already holds. For a creator with lumpy income — a big month in November, nothing in February — knowing roughly what you owe in August rather than the following January is a real improvement.
The dates for 2026/27
If your accounting period aligns with the tax year, you use standard update periods. If it runs 1 April to 31 March, you can choose calendar update periods instead — but you must select them in your software before sending your first update, and you cannot change for that tax year once an update has gone.
| Update | Standard period covered | Deadline |
|---|---|---|
| Q1 | 6 April – 5 July 2026 | 7 August 2026 |
| Q2 | 6 April – 5 October 2026 | 7 November 2026 |
| Q3 | 6 April 2026 – 5 January 2027 | 7 February 2027 |
| Q4 | 6 April 2026 – 5 April 2027 | 7 May 2027 |
| Tax return and payment | Full 2026/27 position | 31 January 2028 |
Calendar update periods run cumulatively from 1 April in the same way, with the same deadlines.
You do not have to wait for the deadline — you can send an update any time after the period ends, and up to 10 days before it ends if you know no further transactions are coming. If you run more than one trade, each needs its own update.
What about the first-year easement?
There are no penalty points for missing a quarterly update deadline during 2026/27. The updates remain legally required, and you must send them before you can submit your annual tax return.
The easement does not extend to the annual return or to payment. Penalty points still apply for a late tax return for 2026/27, and late payment has its own consequences.
From 2027/28, missing a quarterly update deadline normally produces one penalty point. The threshold is four points, after which a £200 penalty is charged.
The first-year easement gives room to establish the process without quarterly penalty points. The legal obligation and the annual filing requirements still apply.
Why creators find this harder than most sole traders
The underlying process is manageable once the right records and software are in place. Creator income makes that setup less straightforward.
Multiple platforms, different currencies, different timings. Ad revenue from Google in dollars, a brand fee through an agency, affiliate commission from three networks, subscription income paid 45 days in arrears. Each needs to land in the right period, converted to sterling. A dedicated business account and bank feed give a strong starting point, but they do not replace platform statements, agency statements, or records of amounts retained as fees — settlements often arrive net, while your records need the gross income and the fee as a separate expense.
Non-cash income. Gifted products received in return for promotional work are income, and they never touch your bank account, so a feed will not capture them. If gifted products are a meaningful part of your year, they need entering deliberately.
The threshold is on turnover. Because it is measured before expenses, creators with substantial costs can enter MTD while their taxable profit remains comparatively modest. A creator with £60,000 of turnover who pays an editor £14,000 still has £60,000 of qualifying income, not £46,000. The expense may reduce taxable profit, but it does not reduce the MTD threshold figure.
If you have not started yet
Check whether you are in scope. Use HMRC's tool and your 2024/25 return. If your qualifying income was £50,000 or less, you are not required to join for 2026/27 on the threshold test alone — although the lower thresholds may bring you in during a later year.
Check whether an exemption might apply before assuming you must comply.
Sign up. You can sign up on GOV.UK. You need to be registered for Self Assessment and to have filed a return in the last two years.
Get compatible software from HMRC's recognised list. Free options exist for straightforward cases.
Build your records from 6 April. Bank feeds usually pull historic transactions back in. Add anything that did not pass through the account — platform income held by a payment processor, amounts retained as fees, and any taxable gifted products.
Submit, then set a reminder for the next deadline.
If you are approaching the threshold but not over it, treat this year as a rehearsal. The threshold falls to £30,000 from April 2027 and £20,000 from April 2028, assessed on 2025/26 and 2026/27 income respectively. A creator whose qualifying income for 2026/27 ultimately exceeds £20,000 is expected to enter MTD from April 2028, subject to the rules and exemptions applying then — and a year of clean digital records makes that a non-event.
Where creators get caught
Waiting for a letter. HMRC writes to people it believes are in scope, but the duty to check is yours.
Checking profit against the threshold. It is turnover. Expenses do not reduce it.
Checking this year's income. Your 2026/27 position was set by your 2024/25 return.
Assuming a salary keeps you out. PAYE is excluded from qualifying income, but it does not shelter your self-employment turnover from the test.
Thinking each update covers only the last quarter. They are cumulative from the start of the tax year.
Skipping an update because nothing happened. A nil period still needs an update.
Reading the easement as a year off. Updates must be filed before the annual return can be submitted.
Where CreatorBooks fits
CreatorBooks is a UK accountancy firm built for creators. Multi-platform income, settlements arriving net of fees, non-cash receipts and quarterly digital reporting are exactly the combination we focus on, because the creator version of MTD is harder than the version most guidance is written for.
Not sure whether you are in scope? The free Creator Tax Check takes about a minute and flags the areas worth looking at.
Related questions
Does MTD apply to my limited company?
No. Making Tax Digital for Income Tax applies to sole traders and landlords. Companies file Corporation Tax returns and are outside this regime. If you run your creator business through a company but also have self-employed or rental income personally, the test applies to those personal income sources.
My income is mostly a salary. Am I in scope?
Employment income through PAYE does not count towards qualifying income. But if your self-employment and property turnover on its own exceeded the threshold, you are in scope regardless of what you earn from a job.
Do gifted products count towards the threshold?
Where a gifted product is a taxable trading receipt, its value forms part of your income — and qualifying income is measured before expenses. It is one reason creators can be closer to the threshold than their bank statements suggest.
What if I miss a quarterly deadline?
There are no penalty points for missing a quarterly update deadline during 2026/27. The update is still required, and you must send it before you can submit your annual tax return. Penalty points do still apply to a late tax return, and late payment has separate consequences. From 2027/28, a missed quarterly deadline normally produces one penalty point, with a £200 penalty at four points.
Can I use a spreadsheet?
Not on its own. Updates must be submitted through HMRC-recognised software, though bridging software can connect a spreadsheet. Records must also be kept digitally.
This article provides general information only and is not tax advice. Tax treatment depends on individual circumstances, and rules and thresholds can change.