Your State Pension Went Up in April – But Can You Actually Live On It?

The DWP state pension rise happened back in April 2025. Pensioners got 4.1% more money, which the government banged on about like they’d just handed out lottery winnings. In reality? It’s £9.05 a week extra if you’re on the full new State Pension. That’s £470 a year. Try making that stretch when your energy bill’s gone up by three times that amount.

The basic State Pension, for anyone who retired before April 2016, went up by £6.95 weekly. That’s £361 annually. My mate’s mum said it barely covered her council tax increase. She wasn’t being dramatic either, as the council tax in some areas went up by £100 or more this year alone.

What You’re Actually Getting

How much state pension will I get at 66? Depends on your National Insurance record, doesn’t it? If you hit State Pension age after 6th April 2016, you’re on the new system. The full amount for 2025/26 is £230.25 a week. Works out to £11,973 yearly before tax kicks in.

But what they don’t advertise is that only about half the people on the new State Pension get that full amount. Royal London did some digging and found roughly 150,000 pensioners scraping by on less than £100 a week. A WEEK. That’s criminal when you’ve worked your whole life.

You need 35 qualifying years of National Insurance to get the full pension. Took time off to raise kids? Cared for your elderly parents? Worked part-time because childcare costs were mad?

Each gap in your record means less money when you retire. Seems a bit backwards, punishing people for doing the right thing.

People on the old basic State Pension get £176.45 weekly now, which is £9,175 a year. You needed 30 qualifying years for this one. Again, most people don’t get the full whack because life happened.

Why Women Still Get Less

How much is the state pension for a woman? It shouldn’t be different from a man’s, but it usually is. Not because the rules are sexist – they’re not, officially – but because women’s working lives look different.

Women take career breaks. They go part-time. They do the unpaid caring work that society needs but doesn’t value financially.

All those gaps in National Insurance contributions add up, and suddenly you’re retiring on two-thirds of what a bloke gets because you spent fifteen years juggling work and family.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies reckons that the state pension gap between men and women born in the early 1950s is basically closed to nothing now.

That’s decent. But when you look at private pensions, women still have about 45% less than men. The state pension might be fair, but retirement definitely isn’t.

There’s this thing called a Category B pension for married women born before 6th April 1953. You can top up your pension based on your husband’s National Insurance record, getting up to 60% of his amount.

So if he’s on the full basic pension of £176.45, you could claim £105.70 weekly based on his contributions. Both need to be State Pension age, though.

What’s Happening with Future Rises

The DWP state pension rise latest news for April 2026 looks like it’ll be 4.8%. That’s what average earnings growth came in at, and because of the triple lock, that’s what pensioners will get. The full new State Pension would hit £241.30 a week.

Martin Lewis pointed out something interesting about this. That’s just over £12,500 a year, which gets dangerously close to the personal tax allowance of £12,570.

The government’s frozen that allowance until 2028, so if the pension keeps rising, millions of pensioners will start paying income tax just on their state pension. They won’t be happy about that, I can tell you.

The triple lock says the State Pension goes up each year by whichever is highest- inflation, average earnings, or 2.5%. For 2025, earnings were at 4.1%. Inflation was only 1.7%, which is what working-age benefits got. You can imagine how that went down with people struggling on Universal Credit.

Can You Actually Live On It?

Let’s talk about what £11,973 a year actually buys you in 2025. The Retirement Living Standards reckon you need £14,400 annually just for a “minimum” retirement as a single person. That covers basic needs such as housing, food, bills, and maybe a cheap holiday if you’re lucky.

The full State Pension doesn’t even reach that minimum. You’re £2,427 short before you start.

Want a “moderate” lifestyle with a proper week away somewhere nice, eating out occasionally, running a car? That’s £31,300 a year. Nearly three times what the State Pension gives you.

No wonder pensioners are struggling. The DWP state pension rise of 4.1% sounds alright until you work out that £9.05 extra doesn’t even cover the increase in your weekly food shop. My neighbour Barbara is 68 and gets the full pension.

She said the rise just about matched her council tax going up. Nothing left for anything else.

Energy bills have doubled for some people. Food’s more expensive every single week. Bus fares keep climbing. That pension increase gets swallowed up immediately and you’re back to square one, just with slightly bigger numbers on paper.

Checking What You’ll Get

There’s a State Pension forecast tool on the government website if you want to see what you’re entitled to. Takes about five minutes. Shows your National Insurance record and tells you if you’ve got gaps worth filling.

Worth mentioning: You can buy voluntary national insurance contributions to fill gaps. Usually you can only go back six years, but there was an extension letting people go back to 2006. The deadline was 5th April 2025 and it’s gone now, though there were whispers HMRC’s system wasn’t working properly, so they might extend it again. Keep an eye out.

Buying extra years can be brilliant value. Each year costs about £800 and could add £300 to your annual pension. Over twenty years of retirement, that’s £6,000 back from an £800 payment. Where else are you getting returns like that?

What’s Coming Next Year

The next DWP state pension rise in April 2026 looks set for 4.8% if predictions hold. That’ll push the full new State Pension to about £241.30 weekly, assuming nothing mental happens with the economy between now and then.

Labour has promised to keep the triple lock for this whole parliament, which runs until 2029 at least. So pensioners should see their State Pension go up each year by at least 2.5%, probably more if wages or inflation are higher.

But percentage rises don’t mean much when you’re starting from too little. A 4.8% increase on not-enough money still leaves you with not-enough money. Just slightly more of it.

The other issue is what happens long-term. More people living longer, fewer workers paying in. Something’s got to give. Either taxes go up massively, retirement age keeps climbing, or future pensions get cut. Probably all three if we’re being honest.

Is the New State Pension Unfair to Existing Pensioners?

Coming back to this because it matters. People who retired on the old system before April 2016 often feel hard done by. The new system’s supposedly fairer and simpler, but it doesn’t always work out better for them.

Some people built up a decent additional state pension through SERPS or the State Second Pension. Those extras only went up by inflation this year, not the full 4.1%. So someone with £50 a week in SERPS got a much smaller overall rise than someone on the new flat-rate system.

There’s also the issue of contracting out. If you were in a workplace pension that contracted out decades ago, your new State Pension gets reduced now. You followed the rules at the time, saved properly in a private pension, and now you’re worse off because of it. Feels like punishment for doing what you were told was sensible.

The government says the new system’s fairer overall because it’s clearer and you know exactly what you’re getting. Maybe. But when you’re the person losing out because of choices you made thirty years ago under completely different rules, “fairer overall” doesn’t help much.

Bottom Line

The DWP state pension rise put a bit more money in pensioners’ pockets in April 2025. That’s better than nothing, especially after a couple of years where inflation went crazy and everything got pricey.

But let’s not kid ourselves; this 4.1% rise has solved anything. Pensioner poverty’s still real. The State Pension still doesn’t cover even a minimum standard of living. Anyone planning to retire on just the State Pension needs to have a serious rethink about what their retirement will actually look like.

How much State pension will I get at 66? Maybe the full £230.25 a week if you’re lucky and you’ve got a complete National Insurance record. More likely something less. Either way, it won’t be enough on its own. You’ll need savings, a workplace pension, or extremely low outgoings to make retirement work.

The fairest thing to say is this year’s rise kept pace with earnings, so pensioners haven’t fallen further behind. Given how wages have stagnated and living costs have climbed, staying level is actually an achievement. Not exactly thrilling, but better than going backwards.