NHS District Nurse Take-Home Pay 2026/27: What Community Nurses Keep Each Month

Last updated: 29 October 2026 · Figures verified against the NHS Employers 2026/27 pay circular.

By the NHS Bands Pay editorial team

A district nurse salary is quoted gross, but nobody budgets gross. The number that matters at the end of the month is what lands in the bank after pension, tax, National Insurance and, for many district nurses, a student loan. This page works that number out step by step for every Band 6 and Band 7 step in England in 2026/27, so a district nurse can find their own step, read across, and see the monthly figure that follows from the published pay scales.

Community nursing spans Bands 5 to 7, and the bands mark real career steps. A community staff nurse without the district qualification is typically Band 5, on £32,073 to £39,043. A qualified district nurse, holding the Specialist Practitioner Qualification in district nursing, is typically Band 6, on £39,959 to £48,117. A community team leader, holding a caseload and leading a neighbourhood team of community staff nurses, nursing associates, healthcare assistants and trainees, is typically Band 7, on £49,387 to £56,515. The Specialist Practitioner Qualification is usually a part-time postgraduate year alongside work, and it is typically employer-funded: a nurse keeps Band 5 salary while studying and moves to Band 6 on qualification. That single qualification is the biggest pay lever in community nursing, worth £916 a year at the step itself, from Band 5 top to Band 6 entry, and far more across the full band, since Band 6 tops out at £48,117 against £39,043 at Band 5 top.

The setting changes the payslip almost as much as the band. Hospital nurses at the same band often take home more in practice, because 24/7 rotas generate large unsocial-hours enhancements, while community nursing trades that premium for largely weekday working, with evening and weekend cover on top. A district nurse who wants the enhancements back can pick up bank shifts or out-of-hours community cover. The headline table below starts from basic pay only, then the later sections add those elements one at a time, so district nurses in every setting can build their own figure. Mileage is treated separately throughout, because it reimburses driving costs rather than paying for time.

Every figure on this page follows the same method. Pension comes off gross pay first, and tax is calculated on what remains. That order matters, because it means pension contributions also reduce the tax bill. National Insurance is calculated on full gross pay, not on pay after pension. Student loan deductions are shown in a separate column, because they apply only to borrowers. The method is the same one used in the nurse take-home pay guide, the midwife take-home pay guide, the paramedic take-home pay guide, the healthcare assistant take-home pay guide, the pharmacist take-home pay guide, the physiotherapist take-home pay guide, the radiographer take-home pay guide, the occupational therapist take-home pay guide, the sonographer take-home pay guide and the biomedical scientist take-home pay guide.

Monthly take-home by band step: the full table

Read the table by band and step. Gross salary is the full-time 2026/27 Agenda for Change figure for England. Pension, income tax and National Insurance are monthly amounts. Take-home is what remains after those three deductions, before any student loan. The final column shows take-home after a Plan 2 student loan, the most common plan for recently qualified district nurses.

Two steps deserve a second look. The move from Band 6 top to Band 7 entry is small in gross terms, just £1,270 a year, because the bands overlap, and take-home rises by only £67.90 a month. The real gain from team leadership is not the step itself but the higher ceiling and the wider role: Band 7 tops out at £56,515, against £48,117 at Band 6 top, a gross gap of £8,398 a year and a take-home gap of £443.03 a month. The move inside Band 6 is steadier: entry to intermediate adds £2,211 a year gross and £118.21 a month in take-home, while intermediate to top adds £5,947 a year gross and £317.97 a month. District nurses budgeting around the team leader post should budget on the take-home column, not the gross column, and should weigh the cover rota of the new post alongside the basic pay, because a Band 7 post with regular weekend cover can pay materially more in the bank than a Band 7 post on weekday lists alone.

For the hourly view of the same bands, see the district nurse hourly pay guide, which breaks Band 6 and Band 7 down by the hour, including night, weekend and on-call rates. For the gross salary picture, including role descriptions and progression routes, see district nurse salary. The hourly rate calculator converts any of these salaries to an hourly figure for a different contracted hours pattern.

A worked month: the Band 6 entry payslip

Take a district nurse on Band 6 entry, £39,959 a year, full-time, no student loan, standard tax code. Gross monthly pay is £3,329.92. Pension at 9.8% takes £3,915.98 a year, which is £326.33 a month, leaving £36,043.02 of pay after pension for tax purposes. Take off the £12,570 personal allowance and taxable income is £23,473.02 a year, all of it inside the 20% basic-rate band, giving annual tax of £4,694.60, or £391.22 a month. National Insurance is 8% of the £27,389 between £12,570 and the salary, giving £2,191.12 a year, or £182.59 a month, with no 2% slice because pay sits below £50,270. What is left is £29,157.30 a year, which is £2,429.78 a month. With a Plan 2 student loan, a further 9% of the £10,574 above the £29,385 threshold comes off, which is £951.66 a year, or £79.30 a month, leaving £2,350.48.

That worked month doubles as a cross-check on the whole table, because the same method produces every row. A district nurse who gets a different payslip figure can start by looking for a different tax code, a student loan plan, or unsocial hours, overtime and on-call on top of basic pay, rather than doubting the arithmetic. Rounded to the pound, the two anchor figures are £2,430 a month at Band 6 entry and £3,309 at Band 7 top. The district nurse salary page itself quotes the same two anchors in hourly form, £20.41 an hour at Band 6 entry and £28.87 at Band 7 top, which matches this table exactly.

Pension: the deduction that also cuts the tax bill

Pension is the largest deduction for most district nurses, and it is also the one that does quiet work elsewhere. Because contributions come off before tax is calculated, every pound of pension contribution saves 20p of basic-rate tax at these income levels, and 40p once taxable income passes into the higher rate. The contribution tiers for 2026/27 are provisional, calculated from the published 2025/26 thresholds, and the employer adds 23.7% on top of every member contribution. The full tier set is:

District nurses face one pension tier change inside the two bands: Band 7 entry and intermediate pay 9.8% but the Band 7 top step pays 10.7%. Band 6 is unusually clean to budget for: every step in the band pays 9.8%, so each step rise flows through to take-home at the same pension rate, with only tax and National Insurance taking their share. With London weighting the Band 7 top total of £65,261 in inner London still sits below the £67,668 boundary for the 12.5% tier, so the rate stays at 10.7% even there.

Full pension tier tables by band are in the pension contributions by band guide, and the wider pension picture is in NHS pension contributions. Opting out of the pension would lift take-home in the short term, but it would also give up the employer 23.7% contribution and the pension itself, so this page treats pension membership as the normal case and does not present an opt-out figure as a recommendation. District nurses employed by GP practices face a different pension structure entirely, which is one more reason the two sectors cannot be compared on headline pay alone.

Student loans: the fifth deduction

Student loan repayments are not tax and they are not pension, but they come off the same payslip, so they belong in any honest take-home figure. The table below shows Plan 2 only, because it is the plan most recently qualified district nurses carry. Plan 2 takes 9% of pay above £29,385 a year in 2026/27. Older plans and postgraduate loans use different thresholds, and a district nurse on one of those plans should run the threshold for their own plan rather than reading the Plan 2 column as their figure.

The full student loan rules for NHS staff, including Plan 1, Plan 4, Plan 5 and postgraduate thresholds, are in the student loan repayments guide, and the student loan calculator works out the deduction for any plan and salary.

Unsocial hours: what evening and weekend cover adds to take-home

Basic pay is only the starting point for district nurses on cover rotas. Under Agenda for Change Section 2, Bands 4 to 9 get 30% on top of plain time for Saturday and weekday night hours, from 8pm to 6am, and 60% on top for Sunday and bank holiday hours. A district nurse on Band 6 entry earns £20.41 an hour plain time, so a Saturday or night hour is worth an extra £6.12 and a Sunday or bank holiday hour an extra £12.25. A district nurse on Band 6 top earns £24.58 an hour, so the same enhancements are worth £7.37 and £14.75 an hour. A community team leader on Band 7 entry earns £25.23 an hour, so the enhancements are worth £7.57 and £15.14 an hour, and at Band 7 top (£28.87 an hour) they are worth £8.66 and £17.32 an hour.

Put those rates against a realistic month and the effect becomes concrete. A district nurse on Band 6 entry who works one extra Saturday visit shift of 7.5 hours and one extra Sunday visit shift of 7.5 hours in a month, on top of a normal rota, earns an extra £137.78 in gross pay: 7.5 Saturday hours at £6.12 plus 7.5 Sunday hours at £12.25. Annualised, pensionable pay rises to £41,612.36, still inside the 9.8% pension tier, and monthly take-home rises to £2,518.17, a gain of £88.39 after pension (£339.83), tax (£416.07) and National Insurance (£193.62). The gain is roughly two thirds of the gross uplift, because every extra pound is itself pensionable, taxable and subject to National Insurance. District nurses choosing between a weekday-only post and a post with regular weekend cover should compare on this basis: the cover post pays more, but the gap in the bank is smaller than the gap in the rota enhancements suggests. The full unsocial hours rules are in the unsocial hours and overtime guide.

Overtime works on top of the same base, with one split that matters on this ladder. Bands 6 and 7 pay time and a half for overtime, and double time on bank and public holidays, with overtime starting above 37.5 hours a week. A district nurse on Band 6 entry at £20.41 an hour therefore earns £30.62 an overtime hour and £40.82 on a bank holiday, while a community team leader on Band 7 entry earns £37.85 and £50.46. Overtime and an unsocial hours enhancement cannot both be claimed for the same hour. Part-time district nurses should note the threshold rule: hours above contracted hours up to 37.5 are paid at plain time, plus any unsocial enhancement that applies, and overtime rates only start beyond 37.5.

On-call: the community income factor that varies most by provider

On-call deserves its own section for district nurses, because evening and weekend community cover is a normal part of the job. Twilight nursing, overnight district nursing teams and weekend visit rotas are typically organised as on-call or rostered cover, with an availability payment for the on-call period plus call-out payments at overtime rates when you attend. The availability payments are set locally and vary by provider, so this page quotes no on-call figure rather than inventing one. That variation is exactly why two Band 6 district nurses in neighbouring services can take home different amounts: the one on a busy weekend cover rota earns more, and the difference is entirely rota, not band. When comparing posts, ask directly for the on-call policy in writing, how often cover comes round, and what the local availability payment is, because those three answers decide the real gap. The on-call rules are covered in the on-call allowance guide, and the district nurse hourly pay guide works through the same rates by the hour.

Mileage: paid separately, and kept out of take-home pay

Community nursing means driving: between home visits, all day, every day. Agenda for Change pays car mileage at 59p a mile for business miles up to 4,500 miles a year and 36p a mile above that, for journeys on or after 1 July 2026. A district nurse driving 6,000 business miles a year therefore receives £3,195 in mileage: 4,500 miles at 59p gives £2,655, and the remaining 1,500 miles at 36p gives £540. Motorcycle mileage is 30p a mile, pedal cycle mileage is 20p a mile, and a passenger allowance of 5p a mile applies where a colleague travels with you. Mileage is a reimbursement for driving costs, not salary: it does not appear in any take-home table on this page, it is not pensionable, and it does not lift the pension tier. Most trusts also offer lease car schemes for regular car users, and a lease car taken through salary sacrifice reduces pensionable pay slightly, so the scheme choice can move the pension figure by a small amount. When comparing community posts, ask whether the role qualifies as regular car use, because the mileage and lease arrangements are worth thousands a year to high-mileage nurses. The full rates and worked examples are in the NHS mileage rates guide. Note that mileage rates are reviewed twice a year, and the October 2026 review may change rates from 1 January 2027, so check the mileage guide for the latest position before relying on the 59p and 36p figures for a new year.

London weighting: take-home with HCAS

High Cost Area Supplement is pensionable, so it lifts both gross pay and, where it crosses a tier boundary, the pension rate. Inner London pays 20% of basic pay with a minimum of £5,794 and a maximum of £8,746, outer London pays 15% with a minimum of £4,870 and a maximum of £6,137, and the fringe zone pays 5% with a minimum of £1,346 and a maximum of £2,270. At Band 6 entry no minimum or maximum binds: 20% of £39,959 is £7,991.80, inside the inner range, 15% is £5,993.85, inside the outer range, and 5% is £1,997.95, inside the fringe range.

At Band 7 top the caps bind in every zone. Inner London 20% of £56,515 would be £11,303, but the £8,746 maximum caps it, giving total pay of £65,261. Outer London is likewise capped at £6,137, giving £62,652, and fringe at £2,270, giving £58,785. None of those totals crosses a pension tier boundary: all three sit inside the 10.7% tier that runs to £67,668, so the pension rate stays at 10.7% and the monthly pension deductions are £581.91, £558.65 and £524.17, against £503.93 with no supplement. Even so, the inner London Band 7 top district nurse takes home £3,684.92 a month, against £3,308.99 with no supplement. The full London weighting rules are in the London weighting HCAS guide, and the HCAS calculator works out the supplement for any band and zone.

Part-time district nurse take-home pay

Part-time community nursing is common, and part-time take-home does not scale in a straight line from full-time take-home, because the pension tier follows actual pay. A district nurse on Band 6 entry working 0.8 WTE (30 hours) earns £31,967.20 actual pay, which sits in the 8.3% pension tier, while the same nurse on 0.6 WTE (22.5 hours) earns £23,975.40 actual pay, which sits in the 6.5% tier. A district nurse at the top of Band 6 on 0.6 WTE earns £28,870.20 actual pay, in the 8.3% tier, and a community team leader at the top of Band 7 on 0.8 WTE earns £45,212, still in the 9.8% tier, but on 0.6 WTE earns £33,909, which drops to 8.3%. Tax and National Insurance also fall, because both are calculated on actual pay.

Two practical points follow. First, a part-time district nurse whose actual pay falls below the Plan 2 threshold of £29,385 pays no Plan 2 deduction at all, which is the case at Band 6 entry on 0.6 WTE and at Band 6 top on 0.6 WTE here. Second, hours worked above contracted hours up to 37.5 a week are paid at plain time, not overtime rates, so a part-time district nurse picking up extra shifts should check whether those hours are plain time or overtime before budgeting on them. The part-time pay guide and the part-time pay calculator cover the pro-rata maths in full.

Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland

The rates on this page are for England. Scotland agreed a 3.75% award from 1 April 2026 and moved to a 36 hour week, with its own pay scale and its own income tax bands. Scotland also has a nine-tier pension structure from 5.7% to 12.7%, but the tier thresholds are not in the verified data file, so this page quotes no Scotland take-home figure rather than estimating one from the England tiers. Wales applied the 3.3% award, so a Welsh district nurse on the same band and step has different gross pay from an England district nurse even though income tax and National Insurance rates are the same, and no verified Wales Band 6 or 7 district nurse steps are in the data file, so no Wales take-home figure is quoted here either. Northern Ireland had the 3.3% award recommended but not implemented at the last check, so do not budget on it. For the devolved picture, see the Scotland pay guide, the Wales pay guide and the Northern Ireland pay guide.

What the figures leave out

These are basic-pay figures for full-time contracts unless a section says otherwise, and real district nurse income is usually higher and messier. Bank and agency sessions usually pay above the Agenda for Change hourly rate, but there is no national rate card and rates vary widely by region and urgency, so this page quotes no agency figure. The Agenda for Change rate is still the right benchmark, because it is the pension-building foundation: every agency hour worked outside substantive employment is an hour that does not build NHS pension in the same way, and the substantive post also carries annual leave, sick pay and the other Agenda for Change terms that sessional work does not. Any local recruitment premia are also left out, because they are local payments, not basic pay. A payslip that differs from this page by a small amount usually differs because of a different tax code, a student loan plan, or unsocial hours, overtime and on-call on top of basic pay. Monthly components are rounded to the penny, so adding rounded monthly components can differ from the monthly take-home by 1p. District nurses on maternity leave, sick leave or a career break should not read these monthly figures as leave pay: maternity pay, sick pay and the career break guide each follow different rules. Annual leave entitlement itself does not change take-home in a normal month, but the annual leave guide sets out the 27, 29 and 33 day tiers plus bank holidays by length of service.

Frequently asked questions

How much does an NHS district nurse take home each month in 2026/27?

In England in 2026/27, a full-time district nurse on Band 6 takes home £2,429.78 a month at the entry step (£39,959 a year), £2,547.99 at the intermediate step (£42,170) and £2,865.96 at the top of the band (£48,117), after income tax, National Insurance and NHS pension contributions and before any student loan. A community team leader on Band 7 takes home £2,933.86 at entry (£49,387), £3,078.24 at the intermediate step (£51,932) and £3,308.99 at the top (£56,515). A Plan 2 student loan takes a further £79.30 a month at Band 6 entry and £203.48 at Band 7 top. Evening, weekend and on-call work, covered below, lifts those basic-pay figures for district nurses on cover rotas, while district nurses on weekday-only rotas mostly earn basic pay only. Mileage for home visits is paid separately and is not part of take-home pay.

How is NHS district nurse take-home pay calculated?

Pension contributions come off first, which reduces taxable income. Income tax is then calculated on what is left, using the 2026/27 personal allowance of £12,570, the 20% basic rate on taxable income up to £37,700 and the 40% higher rate above that. National Insurance is charged on full gross pay, at 8% between £12,570 and £50,270 and 2% above. Student loans are shown separately, because not every district nurse still carries one. All figures on this page use a standard tax code and basic pay only, with unsocial hours, overtime, on-call, London weighting and part-time working covered as additions. District nurses employed by GP practices or private providers are outside this table: those employers set their own pay and pension arrangements, so their take-home follows different numbers.

What pension contribution comes off a district nurse's pay?

Under the provisional 2026/27 tiers, a district nurse pays 9.8% of pensionable pay at every Band 6 step, £326.33 a month at entry, £344.39 at the intermediate step and £392.96 at the top, and 9.8% at Band 7 entry and intermediate, £403.33 and £424.11 a month. Band 7 top pays 10.7%, £503.93 a month, because its £56,515 salary crosses the £52,778 tier boundary. The employer adds 23.7% on top in each case. The tiers are provisional for 2026/27, calculated from the published 2025/26 thresholds, so treat the monthly pension figures as the best current estimate rather than a final published rate.

How much does a student loan take from district nurse pay?

A Plan 2 loan takes 9% of pay above the 2026/27 threshold of £29,385 a year. That is £79.30 a month at Band 6 entry, £95.89 at Band 6 intermediate, £140.49 at Band 6 top, £150.02 at Band 7 entry, £169.10 at Band 7 intermediate and £203.48 at Band 7 top. Plan 1, Plan 4, Plan 5 and postgraduate loans use different thresholds, so the Plan 2 column is a guide for the most common case among recently qualified district nurses, not a figure for every borrower. The full student loan rules for NHS staff are in the student loan repayments guide.

Do district nurses get unsocial hours pay?

Where the rota qualifies, yes. Under Agenda for Change Section 2, Bands 4 to 9 get 30% on top of plain time for Saturday and weekday night hours, from 8pm to 6am, and 60% on top for Sunday and bank holiday hours. A district nurse on Band 6 entry earns £20.41 an hour plain time, so a Saturday or night hour is worth an extra £6.12 and a Sunday or bank holiday hour an extra £12.25. At Band 7 top (£28.87 an hour) the same enhancements are worth £8.66 and £17.32 an hour. Community nursing is mostly weekday working, so most district nurses earn far less in enhancements than hospital nurses at the same band, and the worked example in the unsocial hours section puts a realistic month against those rates.

Do district nurses get on-call pay and mileage?

Evening and weekend community cover is typically organised as on-call or rostered cover, with an availability payment for the on-call period plus call-out payments at overtime rates when you attend. Those availability payments are set locally and vary by provider, so this page quotes no on-call figure rather than inventing one. Mileage is separate from pay: Agenda for Change pays 59p a mile for car business miles up to 4,500 miles a year and 36p a mile above that, so a district nurse driving 6,000 business miles a year receives £3,195 in mileage. Mileage is a reimbursement for driving costs, not salary, so it does not appear in the take-home tables and it is not pensionable.

What does a district nurse take home in London?

With High Cost Area Supplement, a district nurse on Band 6 entry takes home £2,857.07 a month in inner London, £2,750.25 in outer London and £2,536.60 in the fringe zone, against £2,429.78 with no supplement. A community team leader on Band 7 top takes home £3,684.92 a month in inner London, £3,572.78 in outer London and £3,406.56 in the fringe zone. London weighting is pensionable, so it also lifts the pension contribution. At Band 6 entry no minimum or maximum binds: 20% of £39,959 is £7,991.80, inside the inner range, 15% is £5,993.85, inside the outer range, and 5% is £1,997.95, inside the fringe range. At Band 7 top the caps bind in every zone: inner London is capped at £8,746, outer London at £6,137 and the fringe at £2,270.

What does a part-time district nurse take home?

A district nurse on Band 6 entry working 0.8 WTE (30 hours) takes home £2,034.45 a month on actual pay of £31,967.20, and £1,627.93 on 0.6 WTE (22.5 hours, £23,975.40). A district nurse at the top of Band 6 on 0.6 WTE takes home £1,865.76 a month on actual pay of £28,870.20. A community team leader on Band 7 top working 0.8 WTE takes home £2,710.64 a month (£45,212 actual pay) and £2,140.21 on 0.6 WTE (£33,909). The pension tier follows actual pay, not full-time pay, which is why the part-time figures sit in different tiers: Band 6 entry on 0.8 or 0.6 WTE drops to 8.3% and 6.5% respectively, Band 6 top on 0.6 WTE sits at 8.3% because its £28,870.20 actual pay sits just above the 6.5% ceiling of £28,854, and Band 7 top on 0.6 WTE drops to 8.3%. A part-time district nurse whose actual pay falls below the Plan 2 threshold of £29,385 pays no Plan 2 deduction at all, which is the case at Band 6 entry on 0.6 WTE and at Band 6 top on 0.6 WTE here.