Woking Council Tax 2026
South East, England · 44,680 domestic properties
According to MHCLG, Council Tax levels set by local authorities in England 2026-27, Woking's Band D Council Tax is £2,598.04 for 2026-27, the 37th highest of 350 UK billing authorities (higher than 89% of them) and 11% above the UK average of £2,337.00. Nearest published Band D rates sit with Rochdale, Mansfield, Croydon, South Oxfordshire, then Northumberland, East Devon. Closest published housing-stock shapes include Tonbridge & Malling, East Hertfordshire, South Oxfordshire, Guildford.
How we calculate this rank & percentile
We compare every UK billing authority with a published 2026-27 Band D rate (350 in total). Rank is one plus the number with a higher charge, so equal charges share a rank. Percentile is round(authorities with a lower charge ÷ 350 × 100). The UK average is the simple mean of every council's Band D rate in our coverage set. Because the rank spans all three nations, it compares what each authority charges, not what each charge buys. English bands rest on 1991 property values in eight bands, A to H, while Scotland uses its own 1991 thresholds and Wales revalued to 2003 values with a ninth band. An English Band D home is therefore not the same property profile as a Welsh or Scottish one. Nearest published Band D rates sit with Rochdale, Mansfield, Croydon, South Oxfordshire, then Northumberland, East Devon. See our methodology page for the full source-to-figure lineage.
- £2,598.04
- Band D charge · 2026 statutory
- Above the UK average
- +4.67%
- year-on-year vs £2,482.03
- Middle-half rise
- +11.2%
- vs UK avg £2,337.00
- £5,196.08
- Band H · 18/9 of Band D
Nearest published Band D rates sit with Rochdale, Mansfield, Croydon, South Oxfordshire, then Northumberland, East Devon. Closest published housing-stock shapes include Tonbridge & Malling, East Hertfordshire, South Oxfordshire, Guildford. Open Rochdale for the closest published Band D on the same vintage.
Woking · year-on-year Band D
What changed for Woking
Woking's Band D Council Tax rose from £2,482.03 (2025-26) to £2,598.04 (2026-27). Among 350 billing authorities by percentage rise, it ranks 253.
How to read this Band D change
This is a change in the published Band D charge, not advice about household bills. Precepts, discounts, and banding decide the amount you pay.
See UK year-on-year changesWoking bands A-H schedule
Per-band charge 2026
Woking's nearest Band D charges nationwide
Woking is 37th of 350 on the national Band D list at £2,598.04. Nearest published Band D rates sit with Rochdale, Mansfield, Croydon, South Oxfordshire, then Northumberland, East Devon. The six closest published 2026-27 rates, led by Rochdale, ignore geography on purpose, so a map neighbour is not mistaken for a charge twin. Read the difference column as a pound gap; cross-check the South East ranking further down when you care about local neighbours, and the stock-weighted average when you care what most of Woking's 44,680 dwellings actually pay. Closest published housing-stock shapes include Tonbridge & Malling, East Hertfordshire, South Oxfordshire, Guildford.
| Council | Band D | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Rochdale | £2,600.83 | +£2.79 |
| Mansfield | £2,600.38 | +£2.34 |
| Croydon | £2,599.91 | +£1.87 |
| South Oxfordshire | £2,597.57 | −£0.47 |
| Northumberland | £2,596.94 | −£1.10 |
| East Devon | £2,595.46 | −£2.58 |
Band A–H charge table (2026/2027)
| Band | Annual Charge | Monthly | Sole occupant (−25%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| A | £1,732.03 | £173.20 | £1,299.02 |
| B | £2,020.70 | £202.07 | £1,515.53 |
| C | £2,309.37 | £230.94 | £1,732.03 |
| D | £2,598.04 | £259.80 | £1,948.53 |
| E | £3,175.38 | £317.54 | £2,381.54 |
| F | £3,752.72 | £375.27 | £2,814.54 |
| G | £4,330.07 | £433.01 | £3,247.55 |
| H | £5,196.08 | £519.61 | £3,897.06 |
England 1991 valuation ranges (Band A–H)
- Band A: Up to £40,000 (1991 valuation)
- Band B: £40,001 to £52,000
- Band C: £52,001 to £68,000
- Band D: £68,001 to £88,000 (reference band)
- Band E: £88,001 to £120,000
- Band F: £120,001 to £160,000
- Band G: £160,001 to £320,000
- Band H: Over £320,000
Source: MHCLG, Council Tax levels set by local authorities in England 2026-27 (area Band D) + statutory England band ratios documented in our methodology. Monthly figure is the annual charge / 10 (most councils use 10 monthly instalments). The sole-occupant column applies the statutory 25% single-person discount, payable when only one adult lives in the property.
What Woking's 44,680 properties actually pay
Woking is one of the authorities where Band D genuinely is the commonest band — 12,630 of 44,680 dwellings (28.3%). The headline rate above therefore describes the typical home here, rather than sitting above it as it does in most of the country. Bands C and D between them account for 53.8% of the stock. 34.4% of dwellings on the England valuation list here are banded below D.
Weighting each band's statutory charge by the number of properties in it gives a stock-weighted average of £2,914.95 per dwelling, £316.91 (12.2%) above the £2,598.04 Band D headline. On that measure Woking is 14th of 318 authorities with published stock counts, against a £2,269.00 average. That places Woking 11th of the 64 billing authorities in South East, above the regional median of £2,511.00.
How to read this stock pattern
Here the standard Band D benchmark and the most common property group point to the same part of the distribution. That makes Woking less sensitive than most authorities to the familiar criticism that Band D is merely a reference property. The stock-weighted amount is still useful: it incorporates the lower and upper bands instead of treating the modal group as the whole area. It should be read as a corpus comparison, not as the bill of a particular address.
This is a two-band centre rather than a single-band market. Bands C and D together contain 53.8% of dwellings, so neither band should be presented as a complete account of the area. The stock-weighted result combines both groups and the smaller tails into one comparable measure. The table shows where that mean comes from and prevents the distribution being flattened into an overconfident "typical property" claim.
Woking sits in the upper quarter of South East on the stock-weighted ordering, above the regional median of £2,511.00. This narrows the comparison from a UK rank to authorities facing the same broad regional context, while still correcting each one for its different band mix. The placement says the council's average published stock is relatively costly within that peer set; it does not convert the mean into an individual household charge.
Closest housing-stock shape: Reigate & Banstead
Reigate & Banstead is the nearest available full-distribution peer for Woking, although the match is not tight. Aligning the two published profiles would require 7.2% of dwellings to move between valuation bands. Even the closest council therefore has a materially different housing-stock shape.
Four largest band differences
- The largest separation is lower on the ladder at Band C: Woking has 25.5% of dwellings there, against 20.2% in Reigate & Banstead. That extra lower-band weight pulls its stock profile away from the peer.
- Another material separation is an upper-band difference at Band E. Reigate & Banstead records 18.0% of dwellings there, compared with 14.2% in Woking, so the peer carries more of its stock at that higher rung.
- Another material separation is an upper-band difference at Band F. Reigate & Banstead records 11.8% of dwellings there, compared with 9.5% in Woking, so the peer carries more of its stock at that higher rung.
- A smaller distinction is lower on the ladder at Band B: Woking has 8.1% of dwellings there, against 6.6% in Reigate & Banstead. That extra lower-band weight pulls its stock profile away from the peer.
How the wider profile compares
Woking has the stronger combined lower-band tilt: Bands A to C account for 5.7% more of its stock than they do in Reigate & Banstead. The nearest match still leaves that bottom-of-ladder difference visible.
Reigate & Banstead carries the heavier upper tail across Bands E and above, exceeding Woking's combined share there by 5.8%. Total-variation distance counts those absolute band gaps without assuming they offset the lower-band pattern.
Both profiles peak in Band D, so the peer match agrees on the most common valuation group as well as the full-distribution distance. The band-by-band gaps above show why a shared mode does not make the profiles interchangeable.
Band H is the most stable point in the comparison, with shares of 1.9% and 1.8%. Reading that near-match beside the largest gaps prevents the peer label from hiding where the two published distributions actually agree.
Show every band direction
- Band A leans toward Reigate & Banstead
- Band B leans toward Woking
- Band C leans toward Woking
- Band D is closely balanced
- Band E leans toward Reigate & Banstead
- Band F leans toward Reigate & Banstead
- Band G is closely balanced
- Band H is closely balanced
This sequence is read from the lowest published band to the highest.
Other close England matches for Woking: Tonbridge & Malling (7.8% redistribution distance); East Hertfordshire (8.2% redistribution distance); South Oxfordshire (8.2% redistribution distance); Guildford (8.7% redistribution distance). Ranked across every published band in the England valuation system, this shortlist shows whether Reigate & Banstead stands alone or sits in a cluster of similarly shaped authorities.
| Band | Properties | Share of stock | Annual charge |
|---|---|---|---|
| A | 340 | 0.8% | £1,732.03 |
| B | 3,620 | 8.1% | £2,020.70 |
| C | 11,400 | 25.5% | £2,309.37 |
| D | 12,630 | 28.3% | £2,598.04 |
| E | 6,360 | 14.2% | £3,175.38 |
| F | 4,240 | 9.5% | £3,752.72 |
| G | 5,260 | 11.8% | £4,330.07 |
| H | 830 | 1.9% | £5,196.08 |
Property-stock source, rounding and weighting notes
Property counts: VOA, Council Tax: stock of properties 2025 (Table CTSOP1.0_SUP, as at 9 September 2025), Open Government Licence v3.0. Counts are published rounded to the nearest 10, so shares are approximate and may not sum to exactly 100%. The stock-weighted average is our calculation: each band's 2026/2027 charge multiplied by its property count, divided by the total. It is a mean across the whole stock, not a bill any individual household receives.
Authorities charging a similar average across their stock
These are the closest authorities to Woking on the stock-weighted measure, which is a different ordering from the Band D neighbours above because it accounts for how each area's properties are banded.
- Sevenoaks£2,936.70
- Reigate & Banstead£2,936.52
- Guildford£2,929.84
- Kingston upon Thames£2,925.63
- Buckinghamshire£2,887.01
Woking's nearest year-on-year movers
Woking moved Band D from £2,482.03 to £2,598.04 (+4.67%, competition rank 253rd of 350). The closest published movements sit with Elmbridge, Hammersmith & Fulham, East Cambridgeshire.
- Elmbridge4.70%
- Hammersmith & Fulham4.69%
- East Cambridgeshire4.68%
- Norwich4.68%
- Torfaen4.67%
- Ipswich4.65%
How Woking compares in South East
Among the 64 billing authorities in South East, Woking's 2026-27 Band D charge of £2,598.04 ranks 10th of 64, higher than 84% of them (£123.04 above the South East average of £2,475.00). Its nearest-charged neighbours in the region:
Regional high-charge outlier: this authority sits in the costliest fifth of South East.
| Region rank | Council | Band D 2026-27 |
|---|---|---|
| 8th | Reading | £2,612.77 |
| 9th | Waverley | £2,604.87 |
| 10th | Woking | £2,598.04 |
| 11th | South Oxfordshire | £2,597.57 |
| 12th | Tandridge | £2,594.85 |
Regional rank out of 64 South East billing authorities by 2026-27 Band D charge (1 = dearest). See the full UK ranking or the complete directory.
Questions answered from Woking's data
These answers use Woking's £2,598.04 Band D rate, the England statutory multipliers, and the VOA stock mix (modal Band D, 34.4% below D).
Is Woking Council Tax above the UK average?
Woking's 2026-27 Band D rate is £2,598.04, 11.2% above the UK average of £2,337.00. It has competition rank 37th of 350, with equal charges sharing a rank. Nearest published Band D rates sit with Rochdale, Mansfield, Croydon, South Oxfordshire, then Northumberland, East Devon.
Which councils have charges closest to Woking?
The closest published Band D rates are Rochdale (£2,600.83), Mansfield (£2,600.38), Croydon (£2,599.91), South Oxfordshire (£2,597.57), Northumberland (£2,596.94), East Devon (£2,595.46). The comparison table above shows the six nearest authorities and the exact difference from Woking.
What is the average Council Tax bill in Woking?
Across Woking's 44,680 domestic properties, the stock-weighted average charge is £2,914.95 for 2026-27. That is £316.91 above the £2,598.04 Band D rate, because the most common band here is Band D (28.3% of the stock) and 34.4% of dwellings are banded below D. Closest published housing-stock shapes include Tonbridge & Malling, East Hertfordshire, South Oxfordshire, Guildford. Property counts are from the VOA 2025 stock release; the weighting is our calculation.
How did Woking Council Tax change for 2026-27?
Band D moved from £2,482.03 to £2,598.04, a 4.67% rise. Its competition rank by annual increase is 253rd of 350; the closest movements include Elmbridge, Hammersmith & Fulham, East Cambridgeshire.
Advice boundary for Woking
They are not personalised advice - expand a question for the figure that matches the tables above for the 2026-27 vintage, then follow the methodology or gov.uk links for a binding bill on a specific property.
Council Tax figure, precept and liability disclaimer
Council Tax charges shown on this page are derived from the published England Band D dataset and statutory England band ratios. They are intended as informational guidance, not as a personalised tax statement or legal advice. Your actual bill depends on your property's assigned band and on any discounts or exemptions that apply to your household. This area Band D is a two-tier total for Woking: district charge plus county, police, fire where separate, and the average parish precept across the district. Nearest published Band D rates sit with Rochdale, Mansfield, Croydon, South Oxfordshire, then Northumberland, East Devon. Closest published housing-stock shapes include Tonbridge & Malling, East Hertfordshire, South Oxfordshire, Guildford. For a binding figure consult your Woking Council Tax bill or the official gov.uk Council Tax service. Figures published in 2026 reflect the 2026/2027 financial year only.
UK tools, directories and band challenge
- Compare councils side-by-side →
- Browse all UK councils →
- Band D national rollup →
- Challenge your band guide →
Charges shown for Woking are the area Band D and statutory band multiples, already including county, police, fire and average parish precepts where they apply. Nearest published Band D rates sit with Rochdale, Mansfield, Croydon, South Oxfordshire, then Northumberland, East Devon.