Pocket money UK: how much to give by age — and what actually matters more

When we first gave our daughter pocket money, we also gave her the talk about how it would work (once per week, we won't buy all things for her anymore etc.). The problem was we didn't really know what we were doing. She didn't know either. She dutifully put the money in her new purse and forgot about it. When we went out, she never had her purse (and we didn't remind her to take it). It just didn't mean anything to her. She didn't understand what we were doing or why.

Pocket money is one of those parenting things that sounds simple until you actually try to do it consistently. Most of us end up winging it — a couple of pound coins here, a fiver on a good week, nothing when we forget — and then wondering why our kids have no idea what money really is (other than a fictional unit of measure to them). Sadly, I was inconsistent with my two. My wife and I agreed the amount, so we were consistent on that; but paying it regularly and on time? We were both useless. Life would happen; priorities and emergencies occurred. I despaired when I realised that my two children didn't really have a concept of money. Worse still, I knew it was my fault.

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Both my children didn't know how money worked. They didn't appreciate that the doll's house, of a specific brand, they wanted would be a few days of an Adult's salary. My eldest had a great grasp of numbers for her age. They learnt about money in school. Still, I felt I was failing them. I wanted them to not just understand money, but to learn how to use it. I wanted them to learn from my mistakes and do better.

Why pocket money actually matters

The research backs this up. A 2026 study published in the Journal of Financial Literacy and Wellbeing (Cambridge University Press) — "How childhood allowance affects financial literacy and monetary attitudes" — found that children who receive and manage an allowance develop stronger financial literacy as adults. The study was conducted in Japan, but the underlying mechanism is universal: handling real money, consistently, builds real understanding. It's not because they become little accountants. It's because they learn the one lesson no classroom can fully teach — money is finite, and choices have consequences.

When your child spends their £3 on a plastic toy that breaks before teatime, that stings. And it should. That sting is the lesson. You don't need to say "I told you so" — the toy already did.

The alternative — where parents buy everything on demand — doesn't just cost more money. It removes the very experiences children need to build good judgement.

How much pocket money should you give in the UK?

There's no magic number, and anyone who tells you otherwise is often selling something. That said, it helps to know what other UK families are actually paying. The NatWest RoosterMoney Pocket Money Index 2025 tracked 354,000 families:

These are averages — not targets. What's included varies: some parents cover school lunches or clubs separately, others roll everything in. The right amount is whatever you can pay consistently.

What matters more than the amount is the predictability. Children learn best when pocket money arrives on the same day, every week or every month, no matter what. Inconsistency — giving more when you're feeling generous, withholding on a whim — makes it feel like a gift rather than a responsibility, and teaches nothing useful.

In the end, we settled on £2 per week for our eldest and £1 per week for our youngest. We based it on how much we could afford, how much we already did for them, and how much we felt they could manage. We regularly review it and will change as they do and as our circumstance change. Whatever you decide upon will be based on your own circumstances and knowledge of your children, the amount isn't the most important thing. It's being consistent.

Should pocket money be linked to chores?

This is the question that splits a lot of parents. The short answer: it depends on how you frame it.

Tying pocket money directly to every chore — "you only get paid if you complete your list" — can backfire. It can make children see family contributions as optional, something they do only for cash. It can also create a perverse situation where they "refuse" a chore they don't fancy and accept the financial consequence, which was never really the point.

What tends to work better is a split system: a base amount that arrives every week just for being part of the family, plus optional bonus tasks that can top it up. Children learn that the household runs on everyone contributing, and they discover that extra effort earns extra reward — which is a reasonably accurate model of how adult life works.

We purposefully set our children up with a base level of pocket money that they get regardless of chores. However, we also split chores (or family tasks in our home) between what everyone must do and optional ones. The optional ones come with some form of reward. But we only pay out the rewards (not always money) if the mandatory ones have been completed. It's been a process of trial and error before we found what works for us. It is what led to the creation of the Harthena Chore module. We tried Chore charts and boards, they worked for a while; but everyone quickly lost interest in them. There was nothing engaging for the children and we found it a 'chore' to keep refreshing them. We still, in all honesty, continue to refine and improve.

Saving, spending, and giving

One of the most useful habits you can build early is the habit of splitting money into pots. Some families use physical jars — one for spending, one for saving, one for giving to charity. Others track it digitally. The mechanism matters less than the habit.

Teaching children to set aside even a small percentage before spending teaches delayed gratification in the most concrete way possible. A child who saves up for six weeks to buy a toy they really want is a child who has practised patience, planning, and the quiet satisfaction of a goal achieved.

We used to have piggy banks like most people. Our children put money in them for saving or their wallets, or purses, for spending. But, particularly for my six year old, it didn't really mean anything to her. Both children weren't saving for anything and neither paid any attention to their piggy banks except the occasional counting them out. Since creating the Harthena Savings module, my children decide what pot they want it in. We made two pots, pocket money (for spending on what they want) and 'Savings'. For the latter we made a rule that they won't have easy access to the savings pot. They decide when, if, and how much they save; but once transferred they can't have it back quickly. In return, we pay them bonus money each month (calculated by Harthena) at a rate we were comfortable. Behind the scenes, we made the decision to put that money in their bank accounts. Whereas, pocket money is just held with us. So it's available to them wherever we are. My 9 year old has a savings goals set on the app and told me, today, that she is saving her pocket money for a new toy she wants. She doesn't want her pocket money balance to go to 0, so she's saving extra before buying it. She made an entire plan on her own! I couldn't be prouder. Whilst my six-year-old has taken to saving like I've never seen before. Every time she gets some money from Grandad, she hands it over to me and asks me to 'load it onto my balance, please dad.' She loves seeing the number grow, she now talks about having enough money to buy this or that, if she wanted. Still, she would prefer to spend my money rather than hers!

What not to do

A few things that tend to undermine pocket money, based on hard experience:

• Bailing them out. If they spend everything on Monday and ask for an advance on Thursday, the answer should usually be no. The discomfort of having no money left until payday is exactly the lesson.
• Using it as punishment. Withholding or reducing pocket money for bad behaviour blurs the line between money and discipline. If you're not careful, it teaches that money is about control rather than responsibility.
• Making it invisible. A bare bank transfer with no fanfare teaches nothing. Whatever method you use — physical coins for young children, a digital balance for older ones — make the money visible and discussable. A balance a child can check, a goal they can see ticking upward, a running total they understand: that's what builds the habit. The mechanism matters less than whether they can see and engage with it.
• Forgetting to adjust it. A twelve-year-old has different social costs than a seven-year-old. Review the amount at birthdays or the start of each school year.

How we actually track it

As I said above, Harthena was initially created to track pocket money for our household. I was awful at remembering how much pocket money my children were owed, how much they spent, and ended up guessing all the time. Doing it in our heads, or manually on paper, just didn't work for us. With Harthena, then Bates Pocket Money on my home server, I set the allowances and when they get paid. I gave the app to my daughters and they would check every week. They know it now is always there, they trust the process and they make plans on it. The app is on their old little tablets. I won't repeat what I've already said, but it's changed the way we operate and already improved the money awareness of our daughters. We no longer have the fights centred around whether we will or will not buy their latest must have toy. Now it's whether they can, or cannot, afford it. They still get sad, but they understand.

The thing I didn't expect is how much my children enjoy seeing their balance. One of my daughters 'borrowed' her mum's phone and went to the bathroom with it. We went to retrieve it (we don't like things like that being taken into the bathroom and we also don't like things just being taken), to find she was looking up her balance and working out how long she had to wait until she met her savings goal.

The bigger picture

We're not trying to raise children who are obsessed with money. We're trying to raise children who aren't anxious about it — who understand it well enough to make sensible decisions without drama.

That starts with an amount we give them each week and a conversation about what they want to do with it. It's one of the more quietly important things we can do for them.

I hope, as my children grow, they will do so learning to respect money and know how to treat it. I want them to learn how to save, how looking after the pennies really do mean the pounds look after themselves, and end up not worrying about money but enjoying life sensibly.

If any of this sounds familiar, Harthena is what we built to make it manageable — free to try, no card needed.