Making Tax Digital for landlords: do you need it, and when?

Updated 7 October 2026

Making Tax Digital (MTD) for Income Tax changes how landlords and sole traders report to HMRC. You keep digital records, and you send a quarterly update from compatible software. Whether you must join, and when, depends on your qualifying income.

When you must join

What counts as qualifying income

• It is your gross income, before expenses (also called turnover). It is not your profit.
• It includes self-employment income, UK property income, and foreign property income if you are UK tax resident.
• If you own a property jointly, your share of the property income counts.
• Employment income, pensions, dividends and partnership profit shares do not count.

Example

You receive £34,000 rent in 2025 to 2026, and your expenses are £12,000. Your profit is £22,000, but your qualifying income is £34,000. That is over £30,000, so you must use MTD from 6 April 2027.

Quarterly updates and deadlines

A quarterly update is a summary of your income and expenses. Your software adds up your digital records for each period and sends the totals to HMRC.

If your accounting period is 1 April to 31 March, you can choose calendar update periods instead. The deadlines are the same.