What exactly is changing with NMC fees?

The annual registration (retention) fee rises from £120 to £143 from 1 October 2026 — the first increase since 2015, approved by the NMC's governing council in April 2026 after a public consultation that ran from 3 November 2025 to 26 January 2026. The NMC has also proposed increases across its other fees, including those for evaluating international qualifications; confirm the current figures for your application stage before you pay.

Why is the NMC raising fees now?

Eleven years of frozen fees met eleven years of inflation: the regulator says its income has contracted by around 28% in real terms, with roughly £180 million in potential income forgone by March 2026. The rise — which the NMC frames as £1.92 a month — is its answer; opponents, including unions, argued nurses should not fund the gap, with Unison warning a third of nurses would 'reconsider' their registration.

Does this change the cost of registering from overseas?

The headline £143 is the annual fee every registered nurse pays. For international applicants, the NMC has also proposed raising its other charges — including the evaluation fees paid during the overseas registration process — so the full pathway cost is set to tick upward. In context, the change is small against the total cost of CBT, English tests, OSCE and visas: it is worth budgeting accurately, and not worth changing plans over.

I'm mid-application — do I need to do anything?

Budget for the post-October figures if your fees fall after 1 October 2026, and confirm the current fee schedule at each payment stage rather than relying on older guides. If a payment stage falls close to the change date, paying before 1 October locks the old price where the option exists. Nothing about the registration process itself — CBT, English evidence, OSCE — changes.

Will employers pay the fee for me?

Many NHS trusts reimburse or support professional fees for staff, and the annual fee is also tax-deductible for UK taxpayers, which reduces its real cost. Ask about fee support during job offers — it is a standard, reasonable question — and claim the tax relief once working; a majority of nurses simply never do.

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Nursing

NMC Fees Rise on 1 October 2026: What £120 → £143 Really Means for International Nurses

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For eleven years, one number in UK nursing never moved: the £120 annual fee that keeps a nurse on the NMC register. That era ends on 1 October 2026, when the fee rises to £143 — the outcome of a consultation that ran from November 2025 to January 2026 and a governing-council decision taken in April, over the objections of unions and a majority of consultation respondents.

If you are an international nurse — registered, mid-application, or still planning — headlines about fee rises deserve context rather than alarm. This guide covers what was actually decided, why the regulator says it had no choice, what else is rising alongside the headline fee, and our honest view of what it should and should not change in your plans.

The short answer

The annual registration fee rises from £120 to £143 on 1 October 2026 — the first increase since 2015, which the NMC frames as £1.92 per month.
Other NMC fees are set to rise too, including the evaluation fees international applicants pay — confirm current figures at each payment stage rather than relying on older guides.
Nothing about the process changes. CBT, English evidence, OSCE and the registration pathway are untouched — this is a price change, not a rules change.
In the context of your total pathway cost, this is small. Budget for it accurately; do not let it move a decision that visas, exams and salaries should be making.

What was decided, and how it got here

The timeline, for the record:

3 November 2025 – 26 January 2026: the NMC ran a 12-week public consultation on its first fee rise in a decade, proposing to lift the annual retention fee by the equivalent of £1.92 a month.
April 2026: the governing council approved the rise — £120 to £143 a year — despite substantial opposition in the consultation responses and union campaigns against it.
1 October 2026: the new fee takes effect.

The regulator’s case is arithmetic: a fee frozen since 2015 met a decade of inflation, leaving NMC income roughly 28% lower in real terms than if fees had kept pace — around £180 million in forgone income by March 2026, by its own analysis. Against that, the regulator collected more than £103 million in registration fees in 2025/26 from a register of nearly 868,000 professionals, and critics asked why efficiency savings could not close the gap instead. Unison warned that a third of nurses surveyed would "reconsider" their registration over a rise — a claim worth reading as campaign temperature rather than literal forecast: the register is a licence to practise, and £23 a year does not, in reality, end careers.

Quietly important for our readers: the NMC also proposed increases across its other fees — including the charges international applicants pay for qualification evaluation and for adding qualifications to the register. The exact post-October figures for each application stage should be confirmed when you pay; our full NMC cost breakdown is the companion to this article and is kept aligned with current schedules.

What it means, case by case

Already registered and working in the UK

Your annual renewal after 1 October 2026 costs £23 more. Two mitigations most nurses leave unclaimed: many NHS trusts reimburse or support professional fees — ask, especially at offer stage, where it is a completely standard request — and the fee is tax-deductible for UK taxpayers, which returns a slice of it through tax relief. Between the two, the real-terms rise for a typical Band 5 is closer to the price of a takeaway than a crisis.

Mid-application from overseas

Nothing about your process changes — CBT, English evidence, OSCE and the sequence stay exactly as they are. What changes is arithmetic: if payment stages fall after 1 October 2026, budget the updated figures, and where a payment lands near the boundary, paying before the change date locks the old price when that option exists. Build your budget from current schedules, not from screenshots in year-old forum posts — the most common cost-planning error we correct.

Still deciding whether the UK is worth it

Zoom out. The full pathway — exams, English test, visa, flights, OSCE — runs into the low thousands of pounds; a £23 annual increment is noise against a Band 5 salary and the settlement route behind it. The decisions that deserve your attention in 2026 are the ones we have documented all year: a more selective NHS hiring market, tougher English and visa rules, and the shift toward exam-ready candidates. Do not let the smallest number on the page make the biggest decision.

Our predictions

The era of frozen fees is over — expect indexation. Having absorbed an 11-year freeze’s lesson, the NMC is unlikely to hold £143 static for a decade; smaller, more regular rises (or inflation-linked review) are the probable pattern from here.
International evaluation fees follow the same slope. The overseas-application fee schedule sits in the same consultation logic; assume the pathway’s NMC-charged components drift upward at the next review rather than staying flat.
Other regulators take the cue. Fee-frozen regulators across UK healthcare face identical inflation maths; the NMC moving first makes it easier for others to follow. Budget for the sector’s prices to move, not just nursing’s.
The register keeps growing anyway. Fee rises make noisy headlines and marginal decisions; licences to practise survive £1.92 a month. Expect renewal rates to barely notice — and the louder consequence to be political pressure on the NMC to show value for the money.

What to do now

Registered nurses: diarise the change, ask your trust about fee support, and claim the tax relief on professional fees — this year and retrospectively where eligible. Most nurses simply never do.
Applicants: rebuild your budget on current fee schedules at each stage, and where a payment falls near 1 October 2026, check whether paying earlier locks the old price.
Planners: keep the fee change in its lane — a budgeting line, not a decision factor. The decisions that matter are market timing, exam readiness and visa sequencing, and our team maps all three in a free consultation.

Frequently asked questions

What is changing and when?

The NMC’s annual registration fee rises from £120 to £143 on 1 October 2026 — the first increase since 2015, approved in April after a consultation that ran November 2025 to January 2026. Other NMC fees, including international evaluation charges, are also set to rise.

Why now?

Eleven frozen years cost the regulator about 28% of its income in real terms — roughly £180 million by its own estimate. The rise is its correction; unions opposed it, and the council proceeded anyway.

Does it change the registration process for international nurses?

No — CBT, English requirements, OSCE and the pathway are untouched. It is a price change only, and a small one against total pathway costs.

Can I avoid or offset it?

Partly: pay pre-October where a stage allows, ask employers about fee reimbursement, and claim UK tax relief on the annual fee once working. Between them, the real cost shrinks substantially.

Should it change my decision to pursue UK nursing?

No. £23 a year is noise against the salary, settlement route and market factors that actually decide this. Put your attention on exam readiness and hiring-market strategy — the things that genuinely move outcomes in 2026.

The honest summary: a regulator caught up with a decade of inflation, nurses will grumble justifiably, and nobody’s UK plan should change because of it. What deserves your planning energy is the market we have tracked all year — selective hiring, exam-ready candidates, tightening visas. For a budget built on current numbers and a strategy built on the current market, book a free consultation, or start with our complete NMC cost breakdown and step-by-step registration guide.