How the triple lock decides each April’s State Pension increase

Every spring the same figure appears in the headlines: the percentage by which the State Pension is rising. Fewer reports explain where that number comes from, which parts of a pension it actually applies to, or why two neighbours on the same street can see quite different increases on their award letters. The mechanism behind it is the triple lock, and once its workings are clear, most of the confusion falls away.

This article sets out how the triple lock works, which of its three measures decided the April 2026 increase, and what it does not touch. It also links to our other State Pension explainers, because the uprating is only one of several things that decide what lands in a bank account.

Three measures go in, one comes out

The triple lock is a government commitment about how the main State Pension rates are uprated each year. GOV.UK describes it plainly: the new State Pension increases each year by whichever is highest of three figures.

• Earnings: the average percentage growth in wages in Great Britain. In practice the figure used is total pay growth for May to July of the previous year, published by the Office for National Statistics in September.
• Prices: the percentage growth in prices measured by the Consumer Prices Index (CPI). The figure used is the annual rate for September.
• 2.5%: a floor, so the rise is never lower than this even when wages and prices are both subdued.

The measures are compared in the autumn, the government announces the result, and the new rates take effect from the first week of the new tax year in April. Nobody has to apply for it. An existing award is uprated automatically.

Which measure won for April 2026

For the increase that took effect on 6 April 2026, the earnings measure was the highest of the three. The Department for Work and Pensions confirmed that both the basic and new State Pensions rose by 4.8% under the triple lock, in line with the increase in average earnings.

Earnings set the rise. The CPI figure of 3.8% is the rate GOV.UK’s 2026/27 tables apply to additional pension and protected payments, which follow prices rather than the triple lock.

What the 4.8% was applied to

The headline rise applies to the two full standard rates. These are the official weekly amounts for the 2026/27 tax year, which runs from 6 April 2026 to 5 April 2027.

Source: GOV.UK, Benefit and pension rates 2026 to 2027. These are the full rates, not individual entitlements.

Over a full year, the full new State Pension at £241.30 a week comes to £12,547.60. That is a reference figure, not a typical award. Many people receive less than the full rate because of their National Insurance record or years spent contracted out, and some receive more because of a protected payment. We explain how that happens in why so many people receive less than the full new State Pension.

The triple lock raises the published rates. Whether it raises a particular pension by the same percentage depends on what that pension is made of.

The parts of a pension the triple lock does not reach

Several elements of a State Pension are uprated each April, but by prices rather than by the triple lock. In GOV.UK’s 2026/27 tables they rose by 3.8%:

• Additional State Pension (SERPS and the State Second Pension), paid on top of the basic State Pension to many people who reached State Pension age before 6 April 2016.
• Protected payments, the amount above the full new State Pension that some people kept from their pre-2016 record.
• Extra State Pension from deferring, which GOV.UK says usually increases each year in line with CPI. Our guide to what putting off your State Pension adds covers how that extra is built up.

Pension Credit is a separate income-related benefit with its own uprating. Its standard minimum guarantee for a single person rose from £227.10 to £238.00 a week for 2026/27.

What the figures for April 2027 already show

The inputs for next April’s review have now been published. The ONS reported total pay growth of 3.9% for May to July 2026 in its September 2026 earnings release, and on 21 October 2026 it reported CPI inflation of 3.5% for the 12 months to September 2026. Both are above the 2.5% floor.

On the usual formula, that would point to earnings again. As simple arithmetic only, 3.9% on £241.30 would give roughly £250.70 a week. That is not an announced rate: the government confirms the figures as part of its annual uprating decision, and official rates should be checked on GOV.UK once they are published.

Who this matters for, and what to check

• Anyone already receiving a State Pension: compare the new weekly amount on the annual uprating letter with last year’s, part by part, rather than applying the headline percentage to the total.
• Anyone with Additional State Pension or a protected payment: expect those elements to rise by prices, not by the triple lock figure.
• Anyone close to State Pension age: the full rate is a ceiling. The official forecast shows the individual figure, and our piece on buying back missing National Insurance years explains when gaps are worth filling.
• Couples where one partner’s income is mostly the State Pension: with the full new State Pension now just below the £12,570 Personal Allowance, the Marriage Allowance may be worth a look.
• Anyone recently bereaved: what continues and what can be inherited is set out in what happens to a State Pension when a husband or wife dies.

The takeaway

The triple lock is a rule about the published full rates: each April they rise by the highest of earnings growth, CPI inflation or 2.5%. In April 2026 that was earnings, at 4.8%. It is applied automatically, it is not a bonus, and there is nothing to claim. The figure that matters to any one household is its own award letter, which may move by a little more or a little less than the headline once every component has been uprated by its own rule.