Is UK settlement changing from 5 years to 10?

Three separate facts, and the headlines routinely blur them:

1. A consultation ran and closed — open from 20 November 2025 to 12 February 2026.
2. The outcome has not been published. The consultation page still says feedback is being analysed.
3. Nothing has changed in the rules. Settlement is granted under the Immigration Rules as they stand, and the continuous-residence and absence requirements are untouched.

Everything below describes what the consultation proposed. Which parts survive, in what form, and from when, is what the unpublished response and any new Rules will settle.

The baseline qualifying period for settlement would rise from 5 years to 10. More fundamentally, the period would stop being automatic: in the Home Office's framing, settlement would no longer be granted after a fixed period but earned by demonstrating sustained good conduct, contribution and integration.

The 10 years is a starting point rather than an answer. Your own period would be that baseline adjusted by your circumstances.

Proposed requirements applying to all applicants, regardless of any adjustment:

• English at B2 level, up from the current requirement.
• The Life in the UK test.
• Annual earnings above £12,570 for a minimum period — whether that is 3 or 5 years was itself part of the consultation — or an alternative income basis.
• Suitability, including no outstanding litigation, NHS, tax or other government debt.

Adjustments subtracted from the 10-year baseline. Only one from this table applies — the largest:

Circumstance	Adjustment
Income above £125,140 for 3 years	−7 years
3+ years as Global Talent or Innovator Founder	−7 years
Income above £50,270 for 3 years	−5 years
5+ years in specified public service roles	−5 years
Partner, parent or child of a British citizen	−5 years
Hong Kong BN(O) status	−5 years
Community volunteering	−3 to −5 years
Advanced English at C1	−1 year

The consultation also proposed adjustments upward — longer periods tied to matters such as having claimed public funds, the manner of entry, or a significant overstay. Only the largest adjustment from each direction applies, and an upward and a downward adjustment combine.

This is the part most people are actually asking about, and the consultation is explicit: it proposes to apply the changes to everyone in the country today who has not already received indefinite leave to remain. It spells out the consequence too — that people due to reach settlement in the coming months and years would be subject to the new requirements as soon as the immigration rules change. So the proposal is not limited to people arriving after a future start date; on its face it reaches those already part-way through a five-year route.

Two things sit against that:

• Settled status already granted is safe. The document is unambiguous that settled status would never be taken away from anyone who has already been granted it.
• Transitional arrangements were consulted on, not decided. The consultation asked for views on whether there should be transitional measures for people already on a pathway to settlement. No decision is stated in the document, and none has been published since.

So the honest position is that the proposal is retroactive in effect, and whether anything softens that for people mid-route is exactly what has not been answered yet.

Proposed to be out of scope:

• Anyone already holding settled status.
• EU Settlement Scheme beneficiaries.
• Windrush Scheme recipients.
• Children in care and care leavers, pending a separate pathway.

Settlement is counted in days of absence, and that is untouched. On most work and family routes the current cap is 180 days in any rolling 12-month period, with naturalisation applying its own limits on top. Other routes count differently, so check which appendix governs yours.

A longer qualifying period would make that record more important, not less: a rolling absence limit applied over ten years is ten years of days you have to account for, not five.

No implementation date has been given. The document says only that responses will be analysed and that a paper summarising them, alongside economic and equality impact assessments, will be published "in due course".

Two moments matter, and they are not the same one:

1. The consultation response — the government's summary of the feedback and what it intends to do. Still unpublished.
2. Changes to the Immigration Rules, laid before Parliament. That is when something binds anyone, and it is where the commencement date and any transitional provisions will appear.

Until the second happens, the current qualifying periods apply.

• Watch the consultation page for the published outcome, not secondary summaries.
• Watch for Immigration Rules being laid before Parliament — that is when something becomes real, with a commencement date and transitional provisions.
• Check the date on anything you read, including this page. Articles written during the consultation describe a proposal; articles written after the outcome will describe something else.

• GOV.UK — Earned settlement consultation
• GOV.UK — Indefinite leave to remain
• GOV.UK — Immigration Rules, Appendix Continuous Residence