How much have UK visa fees gone up over the years? The clearest example is settlement: the Indefinite Leave to Remain fee rose from about £840 in 2010 to £3,226 from April 2026 — roughly +284%. Below is a year-by-year timeline across the main routes, in pounds and Thai baht, compiled from the House of Commons Library and GOV.UK fee tables.
Compiled & reviewed by Sunaree Ko, Founder · Source: House of Commons Library & GOV.UK
UK visa fees have risen far faster than inflation over the past 15 years. The clearest single example is settlement: Indefinite Leave to Remain cost about £840 in 2010 and is £3,226 from 8 April 2026 — roughly +284%. Citizenship (naturalisation) rose from around £720 to £1,709, and the Student visa — about £36 in the early 2000s — is now £558. The biggest single jump was October 2023, when work and visit visas rose 15%, family, settlement and citizenship 20%, and student visas 35%. The longitudinal table below shows the main routes year by year, in pounds and an indicative baht figure.
This is the headline table: the main UK application fee for each route at a handful of anchor years, plus the percentage change since 2010. The baht column is an indicative conversion at about ฿43.5 per £1. Cells marked n/a are years we could not confidently source — see the methodology.
| Route (main fee) | 2010 | 2015 | 2020 | 2023 | 2026 | 2026 in ฿* |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Standard Visitor (6 mo) | ~£68 | ~£87 | £95 | £115 | £135 | ฿5,873 |
| Skilled Worker / Tier 2 (≤3 yr) | ~£350 | ~£564 | £610 | £719 | £819 | ฿35,627 |
| Spouse / partner entry (outside UK) | n/a | ~£885 | £1,523 | £1,846 | £1,938 | ฿84,303 |
| Settlement (ILR) | £840 | £1,500 | £2,389 | £2,885 | £3,226 | ฿140,331 |
| Citizenship (naturalisation) | ~£720 | ~£851 | £1,330 | £1,500 | £1,709 | ฿74,342 |
| % increase since 2010 | → | see below | ||||
| Visitor ~+99% · Skilled Worker ~+134% · Settlement (ILR) ~+284% · Citizenship ~+137% since 2010. Spouse entry shown from 2015 (2010 fee not confidently sourced). | ||||||
*Baht figures are an indicative conversion of the 2026 fee at ฿43.5 per £1 and move with the exchange rate. Figures marked "~" are approximate/indicative anchor years; "n/a" means we could not confidently source that exact year and have left it blank rather than guess. The settlement and citizenship series are the best-documented; the early visitor and Skilled Worker figures are indicative. Always confirm the current fee at GOV.UK. Sources: House of Commons Library briefing CBP-9859; GOV.UK immigration & nationality fee tables (current and archived).
Bar widths are scaled to the largest rise (settlement, ~+284% = full bar). Percentages are the change from the 2010 fee to the April 2026 fee on each route; the visitor and Skilled Worker 2010 figures are indicative, so those percentages are approximate.
The short-stay Standard Visitor visa (up to six months) is the route most Thai travellers use, and it has stayed comparatively cheap. From an indicative ~£68 around 2010 it climbed gradually — about £87 by the mid-2010s, £95 by 2020 — then £100 and £115 after the October 2023 round, reaching £127 in 2025 and £135 from 8 April 2026. That is roughly a doubling since 2010, far less than the settlement or citizenship routes. The exact pre-2020 visitor figures are harder to pin down from a single official table, so they are shown as indicative. For the full present-day breakdown in baht, see our UK visa cost from Thailand page.
The work route — Tier 2 (General) until December 2020, then the Skilled Worker visa — has roughly doubled. A three-year, out-of-country application sat at an indicative ~£350 around 2010, rose to about £564–£575 by 2016 and ~£610 by 2019, then £719 after October 2023, £769 in 2025 and £819 from April 2026. On top of the application fee, work applicants and their sponsors also face the Immigration Skills Charge and the Immigration Health Surcharge, which have risen separately. See our student visa and work-route guides for how these stack up today.
The spouse / partner entry-clearance fee (joining a settled partner from outside the UK) was around £885 in 2014, rose to £1,523 by 2018 and held there to 2020, then £1,846 after October 2023 and £1,938 from April 2025. The headline pain for families, though, is not the application fee — it is the separately-charged Immigration Health Surcharge, which pushes the real cost of a partner visa well above £5,000 once 33 months of surcharge are added. For the income rules behind these applications, see our UK spouse visa guide.
Settlement is the standout. Until 2003 it was free of charge; the fee was introduced at £155, reached £840 in 2010, £1,500 in 2015, £2,389 in 2018, £2,885 by 2025 and £3,226 from 8 April 2026. That makes Indefinite Leave to Remain the single most expensive standard application in the UK immigration system, and the clearest illustration of fees rising well above inflation. This is the route that drives our headline ~+284% figure since 2010.
Naturalising as a British citizen cost about £155 in the early 2000s, around £720 in 2010 and £851 by 2014, then £1,236 in 2017, £1,330 in 2018, £1,500 after October 2023 and £1,709 from April 2026. The House of Commons Library tracks this route in detail in a dedicated briefing (CBP-9965), because the citizenship fee has risen so far above the underlying processing cost.
The increases have not been smooth — they come in named uprating rounds. The major recent milestones, from the House of Commons Library:
The figures on this page are compiled from official and parliamentary sources, with a deliberate bias towards leaving a cell blank rather than guessing. UK visa fees are set in pounds and are identical for all nationalities, so the same history applies to Thai applicants; the baht column is an indicative conversion only.
Primary sources — free under the Open Government Licence:
Last updated: June 2026. Currency note: baht figures use ฿43.5 per £1 and will drift with the exchange rate. The pound figures and rules quoted here should always be confirmed at GOV.UK before relying on them.
UK Visa From Thailand (2026) "UK Visa Fee History: Every Increase 2010–2026". https://ukvisafromthailand.com/en/uk-visa-fee-history — data: House of Commons Library (CBP-9859, CBP-9965) and GOV.UK immigration & nationality fee tables.
Last reviewed: June 2026. This page presents aggregate published fee data from official UK sources for information only; it is not immigration advice and not a quote for any individual application. Figures are headline application fees, exclude separately-charged surcharges, and use an indicative ฿43.5/£1 conversion. Always confirm the latest fees at GOV.UK before relying on them.
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Sunaree founded UK Visa From Thailand and compiles and reviews the guides and data on this site. We are a document-preparation and certified-translation service — not a law firm and not IAA-registered — and every figure is sourced from GOV.UK and the House of Commons Library. Read Sunaree's full bio →