UK Innovator Founder Visa: The UK's Investor Route in 2026

No, not in the classic sense. The Tier 1 (Investor) route, which granted residence for a £2 million investment in UK companies (UK government bonds stopped qualifying in March 2019), was closed to all new applicants with immediate effect on 17 February 2022. The Home Office cited security concerns, including people who had acquired wealth illegitimately and were linked to wider corruption^[9]. Existing holders could still extend until 17 February 2026, and that window has now shut; settlement applications under Tier 1 (Investor) remain possible only until 17 February 2028^[10]. The autumn 2026 Statement of Changes (HC 584, laid 3 September 2026) deletes the obsolete Tier 1 entry and extension provisions from 8 October 2026^[19].

The route the government pointed investors towards instead is the Innovator Founder visa. It opened on 13 April 2023, replacing the old Innovator and Start-up visas, and dropped the former £50,000 minimum-funding rule^[21][23]. Its legal basis is Appendix Innovator Founder of the Immigration Rules (last amended 3 August 2026), administered by UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) within the Home Office^[4]. Every application needs an endorsement letter, issued no more than three months before you apply, from one of four approved endorsing bodies^[5][6].

The practical consequence: money alone does not buy UK residence. What buys it is a credible, innovative business plan, enough funding to execute it, and three years of hands-on management. If you want a passive investment route in Europe, compare the European golden visa comparison or the golden visa programs by country hub.

Several UK routes involve putting capital or a business into the country, but only one is built around founding a company:

• Innovator Founder visa: for founders of a new, innovative business endorsed by an approved body. No fixed investment amount; you must show the endorsing body enough funding and its source. Three-year grants, settlement possible after three years^[1][2][5].
• Global Talent visa: for leaders or potential leaders in academia and research, arts and culture, or digital technology. It is not investment-based, but many tech founders use the digital technology stream. Grants of up to five years; settlement after three or five years depending on the field and stream^[15].
• Global Entrepreneur Programme (GEP): a Department for Business and Trade programme for high-growth companies not yet based in the UK that want to set up an international HQ, subsidiary or R&D centre here (typically from about £250,000 revenue, sector dependent, or strong investor backing). It is invitation-only and endorses its own participants for the Innovator Founder visa^[6][16].
• Tier 1 (Investor): closed to new applicants since 17 February 2022; only legacy settlement applications remain^[9][10].

A £5 million "invite-only" investor visa has been reported but does not exist. On 20 May 2026, Bloomberg reported that the government was considering three years of residence for wealthy individuals investing at least £5 million in priority areas such as fast-growing UK businesses^[20]. As of 2 October 2026 no such route appears in the Immigration Rules, and HC 584 did not create one^[19]. Treat it as a proposal only.

People searching for a "UK business investor visa" usually mean one of two things: the old Tier 1 (Investor) visa, or a way to buy into a UK company and live there. The first is gone. The second is possible only through the Innovator Founder route, and only if you have a key role in the day-to-day management and development of the business. The caseworker guidance states plainly that it is not enough to have only a financial interest in a business^[5].

Tier 1 (Investor) required £2 million (for grants after 6 November 2014) held in a regulated institution and invested in UK companies, with faster settlement after three years for £5 million or two years for £10 million^[24]. Main applicants could extend until 17 February 2026 and must apply to settle before 17 February 2028^[10]. If you are a legacy holder, take advice now: there is no further extension window.

Buying UK property, buying shares in an existing trading company, or making a passive fund investment does not qualify for any UK residence route. The Innovator Founder visa also excludes joining a business that is already trading unless an endorsing body has previously assessed it for you^[1][2]. Investors who want a residence permit tied to a business stake without day-to-day management could look at the Italy investor visa routes, which accept a €250,000 startup stake, or the French Talent Passport investor ground at €300,000.

After three years the main applicant pays £3,226 for indefinite leave to remain, plus the same per family member, and £50 for the Life in the UK test^[7]. The settlement endorsement letter comes from the endorsing body; GOV.UK only publishes the £1,000 initial and £500 contact-point fees, so ask your endorsing body in writing what it charges for an extension or settlement assessment^[6]. Budget £3,226 per family member for ILR, about £13,000 in Home Office fees for a family of four. Note that a partner needs five years' continuous residence as your partner before settling (Appendix Innovator Founder, INNF 37.1), so the family's ILR applications may not all fall in year three^[3][4].

Because the Innovator Founder visa is the working replacement, the 2026 requirements are its requirements^[1][2][4][5]:

• Age: at least 18 when you apply.
• Endorsement: a letter from UK Endorsing Services, Innovator International, Envestors Limited or (by invitation) the Global Entrepreneurs Programme, issued no more than three months before the application and not withdrawn. The 60-plus "legacy" bodies can only re-endorse founders they backed before 13 April 2023^[6].
• Innovation: the business must be new (not already trading), based on an idea you generated or significantly contributed to, and judged innovative, viable and scalable. The endorsing body tests the business plan, your skills and the market.
• Funding: no statutory sum, but you must prove to the endorsing body that you have enough funding and where it comes from.
• English: CEFR level B2 in reading, writing, speaking and listening, through an approved Secure English Language Test, a majority-English-speaking nationality or a degree taught in English.
• Maintenance: £1,270 for yourself, held for 28 consecutive days, unless you have already been in the UK for 12 months.
• Suitability: the general criminality, immigration-history and fit-and-proper-person checks.

Work and switching rules

You can work for your own business and also take employment in roles skilled to at least RQF level 3 (A-level equivalent), though not as a professional sportsperson or coach^[1][4]. You cannot switch in from a visitor, short-term student, parent of a child student, seasonal worker or domestic worker visa. Students can switch once they have completed their course, or after 12 months of a PhD^[5].

Teams

Co-founders can apply together as an Innovator Founder team, but at settlement each founder needs their own growth criteria: if two founders rely on job creation, 20 jobs must have been created, not 10^[5].

Your spouse or civil partner, unmarried partner (two years living together, or an equivalent commitment), and children under 18 can come with you. Children over 18 can apply only if they already hold UK permission as your dependant^[3]. Each dependant pays the same visa fee as you (£1,357 from abroad, £1,693 in the UK) and the Immigration Health Surcharge: £1,035 a year for an adult and £776 a year for a child^[7][8]. You must also hold extra maintenance funds: £285 for a partner, £315 for the first child and £200 for each further child^[3].

Dependants may work (except as a sportsperson or coach) and study. Their permission normally ends on the same date as yours. GOV.UK says dependants can apply to settle after five years, so they may not settle at the same moment as a founder who qualifies in three; plan the family timeline with an adviser^[3][4]. From 26 March 2027, dependent partners and children applying to settle will need B2 English (speaking and listening) instead of B1^[4].

The endorsing body is the real gatekeeper. Expect most of the work, and most refusals, at stage 2^[5][21].

Holding an Innovator Founder visa does not by itself make you UK tax resident; the Statutory Residence Test does. But a founder who actually runs a UK business will almost always become resident, and the UK taxes residents on worldwide income and gains.

The old non-dom remittance basis was abolished from 6 April 2025. In its place is a four-year foreign income and gains (FIG) regime: people who become UK resident after at least ten consecutive tax years of non-residence can claim relief on foreign income and gains for their first four tax years of residence, with no need to keep the money offshore^[13]. After that, worldwide arising-basis taxation applies.

Inheritance tax is now residence-based too. Non-UK assets come into scope once you have been UK resident for at least 10 of the previous 20 tax years, and the exposure tails off over three to ten years after you leave^[14]. A founder who settles and naturalises will usually cross that threshold in year 10. Plan any pre-arrival restructuring, trust settlements and the sale of appreciated assets before you become resident, with a UK tax adviser.

Founders also face standard UK company taxes (corporation tax, employer National Insurance, VAT once registered). There is no UK wealth tax.

The path runs in three steps under the rules in force on 2 October 2026:

1. Innovator Founder permission for at least three years, with absences of no more than 180 days in any 12-month period^[5].
2. Indefinite leave to remain after three years, if your endorsing body confirms significant achievements against the plan and at least two of these: £50,000 invested and spent in the business; customer numbers at least doubled in three years and above the sector mean; significant R&D plus a UK IP application; £1 million annual revenue; £500,000 revenue including £100,000 from exports; 10 full-time jobs for settled workers; or 5 such jobs paying a mean of at least £25,000. You also need the Life in the UK test^[4][5].
3. Naturalisation as a British citizen once you have five years' UK residence and have held ILR for at least 12 months (so about two years after a three-year ILR), with no more than 450 days outside the UK in the five years and no more than 90 days in the final year, B1 English and Life in the UK^[12][17]. The fee is £1,709 plus £130 for the ceremony^[7].

In practice the fastest route is about five years from first grant to a British passport, as long as the business performs. If it does not, you can extend for further three-year periods, but the clock to citizenship moves with it. The UK permits dual citizenship, but check whether your current country does.

Will the earned settlement reform change this?

The November 2025 consultation A Fairer Pathway to Settlement proposes a 10-year baseline for settlement, but lets Innovator Founders and Global Talent holders with three years' continuous residence cut up to seven years from it, so three-year settlement would survive^[11]. The consultation closed on 12 February 2026. On 15 September 2026 the Home Secretary said final decisions would come "later this year", and no rules have been laid, including in HC 584^[18][19]. Transitional protection for people already on the route is undecided, and citizenship reform would need primary legislation^[11][18].

If a second passport is your main goal, compare golden visas with the fastest route to citizenship and our explainer on citizenship by investment versus a golden visa.

It suits founders with a genuinely new product or technology, a funded plan and the intention to live in the UK and build a team there. It works well for tech, life-science and deep-tech founders who might later raise UK venture capital, and for families who value UK schools and a three-year settlement track.

Look elsewhere if you want a passive investment, a property-linked permit, minimal residence, or a plan B you rarely use. In that case, Mediterranean programmes may fit better: the Portugal golden visa fund route needs only about 7 days in year one, and the Malta permanent residence programme grants permanent residence from day one with no stay requirement. If you want the US instead, the EB-5 green card is a passive investment route, while the E-2 treaty investor visa is the closest US analogue to an active founder visa, for nationals of treaty countries only.

• Italy investor visa: €250,000 in an innovative startup, with no minimum stay to keep the permit.
• France Talent Passport (investor): €300,000 in business fixed assets, with a family card for the spouse.
• Portugal residency by investment: a €500,000 fund route; naturalisation now takes 10 years.
• Malta MPRP: permanent residence from about €99,000 in fees plus property or rent.
• Latvia investor residence: €50,000 company capital plus a €10,000 state payment.
• Crown dependencies and territories with their own rules: Jersey high-value residency, Isle of Man residence and Gibraltar Category 2 status. None of these gives UK settlement.
• Canada investor and business routes for an English-speaking alternative outside Europe.

The Irish Immigrant Investor Programme closed on 15 February 2023, so the UK and Ireland both now lack a passive investor visa. Our list of closed golden visa programs tracks the others.