The number on the completion statement and the number you keep are two different figures, and what sits between them is capital gains tax. In 2026/27 that means 24% on most of a business-sale gain, with a short list of reliefs Parliament has chosen to offer: Business Asset Disposal Relief, EIS deferral and SEIS reinvestment relief. Each has conditions. Each has a price.
This is the honest round-up of that list as it stands in 2026. None of these routes is a loophole, and most have tightened in recent Budgets, which is itself part of the story. What follows is what each relief does, who tends to qualify, and what it costs in risk or constraint.
Every relief on this list is a trade. The question is whether you'd take the other side of it without the tax.
The 2026 baseline: what the sale costs before relief
Start with the unrelieved position. For 2026/27, CGT on shares runs at 18% within your basic-rate band and 24% above it, and gains stack on top of your income for the year, so a sale of any size lands almost entirely at the higher rate. The annual exempt amount is £3,000, which on a seven-figure gain is a rounding error rather than a plan. Current rates are at GOV.UK.
The headline relief is Business Asset Disposal Relief, which taxes qualifying gains at 18% up to a lifetime limit of £1,000,000. That rate has been climbing: 10% until 5 April 2025, 14% in 2025/26, 18% from 6 April 2026. Two Budgets, two rises. At today's rates the full relief saves six percentage points on £1m of gain, up to £60,000, where the old 10% rate saved £140,000. Real money still, but a different order of relief. We covered the rise in our BADR explainer.
BADR done right
BADR (the relief formerly called Entrepreneurs' Relief) doesn't arrive automatically with a sale. Broadly, for the two years before disposal you need a 5% or larger holding, you must be an officer or employee of the company, and the company must be a trading company, not an investment vehicle. Each condition can fail quietly.
The classic ways sellers lose it: dilution that drops a stake under 5% in a late funding round; resigning before completion and breaking the officer-or-employee condition; the company sitting on so much cash and so many investments that HMRC questions whether it still mainly trades. None of these announces itself at the time, which is why sellers who expect to rely on the relief tend to have the position checked before heads of terms, not after. The full conditions are set out at GOV.UK.
And the lifetime limit bites. £1,000,000 is the cap on gains relieved across your whole life, and claims made under the old Entrepreneurs' Relief count against it. Past the million, you're back at the standard rates.
The reinvestment routes: EIS deferral and SEIS exemption
Two venture-scheme reliefs reach back to a business-sale gain, and both are for individuals only. A limited company can claim neither.
EIS deferral relief postpones the CGT on the sale when you reinvest the gain (the gain itself, not the whole proceeds) into EIS-qualifying shares, in a window from one year before to three years after the disposal. The bill doesn't vanish. It comes back into charge when the EIS shares are disposed of, at whatever rates apply then. Deferral is a postponement, never an exemption, and the seller's-side mechanics, including the genuinely awkward interaction with BADR, get a full walkthrough in our EIS deferral guide.
SEIS reinvestment relief is the one outright exemption in the set, and the smallest. Reinvest a gain into SEIS shares and 50% of it is exempt, on up to £100,000 of gains per tax year. So at most £50,000 of gain escapes charge in a year, a saving of up to £12,000 at 24%. The price is the asset class: SEIS companies sit at the earliest, riskiest end of the market. HMRC's investor guidance for both schemes is at GOV.UK.
The honest accounting
Every route above swaps a known tax bill for a constraint or a risk, and the swap only makes sense if you'd accept the other side of it anyway.
BADR costs the least. Its price is paid in conditions held for two years and in a lifetime cap. The reinvestment reliefs cost more, because what the relief buys you into is early-stage equity, an asset class where total loss is a normal outcome rather than a tail case. Chasing relief into a weak company is the classic post-exit error; a bad investment with generous tax treatment is still a bad investment, just slightly cheaper. Relief follows risk for a reason.
The other moving part is time. A deferred gain returns at the rates in force when the EIS shares are disposed of, and the recent direction of travel has been upward: BADR alone has risen twice in two years. Anyone planning around today's percentages is planning around numbers with a habit of changing each Budget.
A note on what this isn't
This piece describes the rules; it doesn't tell you what to do with them. Whether BADR applies to your sale, whether deferral helps or merely delays, whether SEIS-grade risk has any place in your position at all: each of those turns on facts about you that a blog can't see, and on rules that shift with each Budget. Confirm the current figures at GOV.UK and take FCA-regulated tax and financial advice before acting on a gain of any size. Early-stage shares can lose the lot, relief or not.
Frequently asked questions
What CGT do I pay when I sell my business in 2026?
If the gain qualifies for Business Asset Disposal Relief, it is taxed at 18% up to a £1,000,000 lifetime limit. Otherwise, and above that limit, gains are taxed at 18% within your basic-rate band and 24% above it, after the £3,000 annual exempt amount. Gains stack on top of your income for the year, so larger sales fall mostly at 24%. Confirm the current rates and conditions at GOV.UK.
Can EIS wipe out the CGT from my business sale?
No. EIS deferral relief postpones the tax rather than erasing it: reinvest the gain into EIS shares within the window of one year before to three years after the sale, and the deferred gain comes back into charge when the EIS shares are disposed of, at the rates in force then. SEIS reinvestment relief is different: it exempts 50% of a reinvested gain outright, but only on up to £100,000 of gains per tax year.
What is the CGT annual allowance in 2026/27?
£3,000. That is the annual exempt amount, the slice of total gains in a tax year on which no CGT is due. On a business sale it covers very little of the gain; the meaningful reliefs are BADR and the reinvestment routes. Check the current figure at GOV.UK, as it has been cut sharply in recent years.
Is BADR still worth claiming at 18%?
The relief is smaller than it was, but it still sits six percentage points below the 24% higher rate, which on a full £1,000,000 of qualifying gains is up to £60,000. When the rate was 10%, the same claim saved up to £140,000, so the gap has narrowed considerably across two Budgets. Whether it applies depends on meeting the conditions for the two years before disposal; that is a question of fact for your adviser, not a judgement this article can make.
Which of these reliefs should I use after selling my business?
That is not a question general information can answer. Which reliefs apply, and whether any reinvestment route suits you, depends on your tax position, your appetite for early-stage risk and the detail of your sale, and the rules themselves change at Budgets. This article is informational only, not financial or tax advice. Confirm the current rules at GOV.UK and take FCA-regulated advice before acting.