UK immigration 2025: Tougher work rules, tighter student visas & fees hikes

A sweeping reset under UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer reshaped work visas, student rules, settlement timelines and business mobility through 2025

For the UK, 2025 was the year immigration policy shifted from headline-grabbing gestures like the Rwanda flights to a dense mix of salary thresholds, compliance rules and settlement clocks. Under Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper billed the year as a “complete reset” of a system that had allowed net migration to roughly quadruple in four years, and promised a move away from what Labour called a “failed free-market experiment” in migration.

 

At the heart of this reset sits an immigration white paper, Restoring Control over the Immigration System, published on May 12, 2025. It sets out plans to confine work visas largely to graduate-level jobs, phase out mass overseas recruitment in social care, tighten English-language rules, lengthen the route to permanent settlement and trim post-study work rights, all against a backdrop of net migration still around 0.73 million in mid-2024.

 

Through 2025, these ideas were converted into concrete rules in three big waves: visa fee hikes in April, a Skilled Worker overhaul in July, and student/graduate changes and new fee regulations in the autumn, alongside a new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act that rewrote parts of the previous government’s Illegal Migration Act.

 

Here's what changed in 2025 – and what remains on the horizon for 2026.

 

What did the white paper change?

 

The May 2025 white paper is the political anchor for most of the year’s reforms. It set out Labour’s broad strategy:

 

• Limit Skilled Worker visas to jobs at graduate level (RQF 6) and above

• Allow lower-skill recruitment only in sectors that are part of a national industrial strategy

• Push employers to invest more in training UK workers

• Double the usual qualifying period for settlement from five years to ten, unless a migrant can show “significant economic or social contribution”

 

The 10-year settlement idea is not yet in force. It is a stated intention in the white paper and subsequent briefings, with details on “earned settlement and citizenship reform” promised later.

 

For now, the key 2025 changes are concentrated in specific routes and in the separate Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act.

 

How did work visas change in 2025?

 

The single most important technical change of 2025 came into force on July 22, 2025, when the Skilled Worker route was reset.

 

Salary and skill thresholds

From that date, new Skilled Worker applications (outside limited transitional cases) have to meet:

 

• A general salary threshold of £41,700 a year

• A higher skills threshold of RQF Level 6

• Tighter going-rate tables and a new Immigration Salary List replacing the Shortage Occupation List

 

Medium-skilled jobs (RQF 3–5) are now only sponsorable if they appear on a Temporary Shortage List, which the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) is reviewing, with the interim list locked in place until the end of 2026.

 

Social care recruitment cut-off

A headline decision for employers was the end of overseas recruitment of social care workers under Skilled Worker rules from July 22, 2025. New sponsorship for care workers abroad stopped on that date; only limited transitional protection exists for people already in the UK.

 

Employer compliance expanded

The Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025 pulled more employers into the compliance net. As set out in legal commentary:

 

• Compliance duties now extend to agency staff, subcontractors, gig workers and casual staff

• Fines for illegal working checks can reach £45,000 per breach, with potential criminal liability for ignoring offences

 

This is already forcing businesses to tighten right-to-work checks across supply chains.

 

Did family migration rules change?

 

The £29,000 minimum income requirement for partner visas, introduced in April 2024, did not change in 2025. The Labour government kept it in place while commissioning the MAC to assess whether it was too high.

 

The MAC’s June 2025 recommendations included:

 

• Lowering the threshold to around £23,000–£25,000

• Allowing an applicant’s UK job offer or remote income to count

• More flexibility for families with children

 

By late November 2025, the government had confirmed that the threshold would remain at £29,000 for now, and that earlier Conservative plans to raise it to £34,500 and then £38,700 would not proceed.

 

What shifted for international students in 2025?

 

Higher maintenance funds and new caps

From November 11, 2025, students had to show higher living-cost funds, with a higher cap on how much prepaid accommodation could offset. The High Potential Individual route was capped at 8,000 applications a year from November 4, 2025.

 

Compliance pressure and recruitment pauses

From September 2025, refusal rates above 5% began to pose a serious compliance issue for universities under the Basic Compliance Assessment. Several institutions paused or reduced recruitment from Pakistan and Bangladesh as refusal rates rose to around 18–22%.

 

Graduate Route kept but shortened from 2027

The Graduate Route survived political pressure but will shorten from two years to 18 months from January 1, 2027. Doctoral graduates keep a longer stay.

 

What did the new asylum law change?

 

Labour scrapped the Conservatives’ Rwanda scheme but drove forward the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025. Key effects include:

 

•  Repeal of rules barring many asylum claims from being considered

•  Partial lifting of bans on leave and citizenship for people who entered without permission

•  Retention and expansion of detention powers, including for small-boat arrivals

 

Ministers also opened talks with Western Balkan states on “return hubs” for people whose asylum claims fail, while rights groups reported worsening violence linked to UK-funded efforts to stop Channel crossings in France.

 

In September 2025, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood raised the possibility of suspending visas for countries that refuse to take back nationals whose asylum claims are rejected.

 

Were settlement and citizenship rules rewritten?

 

Not yet. But 2025 laid the groundwork for longer, more conditional settlement. Proposals include:

 

• Doubling the standard qualifying period to ten years

• Introducing an “earned citizenship” model with stricter checks on English, integration and tax compliance

 

These changes require primary legislation and are not yet in force.

 

How did fees change in 2025?

 

April 9, 2025: Visa fees rose across Skilled Worker, ILR, sponsor licences and citizenship. A standard adult passport application rose from £88.50 to £94.50.

 

July 1, 2025: A revised table confirmed earlier uplifts and added new fee lines for overseas qualification assessments.

 

November 11, 2025: Further amendments took effect, including adjustments linked to higher student maintenance requirements.

 

Overall, 2025 set a higher-fee environment for nearly all long-term routes.

 

What about mobility under the India–UK FTA?

 

The India–UK free-trade agreement signed in July 2025 kept expectations modest. It protects business mobility routes already used by Indian professionals but does not create new visa categories. Key features include:

 

• Continued access for independent professionals, intra-company transferees and contractual service suppliers

• A quota of around 1,800 visas for chefs, yoga practitioners and classical artists

• A three-year National Insurance exemption for some Indian employees posted to the UK

 

But the agreement does not ease access to Skilled Worker visas or permanent residence. Roles in IT, health care and most medium-skill categories receive no special treatment.

 

What stayed the same in 2025?

 

• The Graduate Route continued in its two-year form (three for PhDs)

• The £29,000 family-income threshold stayed in place

• Ukraine and Hong Kong routes remained outside wider migration cuts

 

What do 2025’s changes mean for 2026 applicants?

 

Going into 2026, anyone planning a move to the UK faces a system that:

 

• Expects higher salaries and higher skills for Skilled Worker sponsorship

• Closes off overseas recruitment of care workers

• Keeps family migration more restricted than before 2024

• Maintains post-study options for now but narrows them for future cohorts

• Tightens student compliance at high-refusal institutions

• Begins the transition towards longer and more conditional settlement