Free MTD Software for Landlords: What's Actually Free in 2026

Is there genuinely free MTD software for landlords?

The honest answer is: barely. There is one truly free MTD service — provided by HMRC itself — but it is not built for landlords. For any landlord whose primary income is rental property, that free service is almost certainly insufficient.

Every piece of dedicated landlord MTD software on the market charges a subscription fee. The range is roughly £10–25 per month, or £96–240 per year if you pay annually. The good news is that almost all of them offer a free trial period, typically 30 days, which gives you real access to the product before you spend a penny.

There is also a category of "bridging software" — tools that take your existing spreadsheet data and transmit it to HMRC's MTD API. Bridging software is cheaper than full landlord MTD platforms (around £8–12 per month) but it is not free. You also still have to do all the record-keeping and categorisation yourself in a spreadsheet, which carries a higher risk of error.

To understand what landlords are required to submit — quarterly updates, End of Period Statements, Final Declarations — see our MTD for landlords complete guide.

What HMRC's free MTD service actually covers

HMRC maintains an official list of compatible MTD for Income Tax software at gov.uk. That list includes a small number of tools that are offered at no charge. HMRC itself provides a free service designed for the simplest cases.

HMRC's free service is primarily designed for people with a single source of simple self-employment income — a sole trader running a service business, for example. It allows basic income and expense entry and can submit quarterly updates via the MTD API.

What it does not do:

• It does not include SA105 property income categories — there are no dedicated fields for rent received, property repairs, letting agent fees, buildings insurance, or Section 24 finance costs.
• It is not designed to handle landlords who have both rental income and self-employment income from different sources.
• It does not import bank transaction data or CSV exports from your bank — every entry is manual.
• It provides no landlord-specific guidance on which expense category a transaction belongs to.
• It may not support End of Period Statement (EOPS) adjustments for property-specific allowances such as the property income allowance.

For a landlord with straightforward rental income — let alone one managing multiple properties with varied expense types — forcing that income through a free self-employment tool risks mis-categorisation that could result in an incorrect tax liability and a subsequent HMRC enquiry.

Not certain whether your income level triggers the MTD mandate at all? Use our MTD readiness checker to confirm your position in under three minutes.

Free trial vs free forever: what landlords need to know

When you search for free MTD software for landlords and land on a provider's website, the word "free" in their marketing almost always refers to a free trial, not a permanently free product. The distinction matters enormously.

A free trial gives you complete access to the software — including bank CSV import, transaction categorisation, quarterly submission, and HMRC connection — for a set period. That period is typically 30 days but can be as short as 14 days. After the trial expires, you either subscribe or lose access.

Free trials are genuinely useful. You can import your real transactions, test how the software categorises them, submit a practice quarterly update to HMRC's sandbox environment, and decide whether the tool earns its subscription fee before you pay anything. Given that most landlords in the MTD regime will be submitting four quarterly updates per year plus an End of Period Statement, a month is enough time to go through one full cycle.

Free trial options for landlords

Low-cost MTD options under £150 per year

If you are price-sensitive but accept that truly free dedicated landlord MTD software does not exist, the next question is: what is the cheapest adequate option?

APARI — limited free tier available

APARI is an HMRC-recognised MTD and Self Assessment tool that offers a limited free tier for very basic use cases. The free tier covers simple income declaration but does not include the full suite of SA105 landlord categories or bank feed integration. Paid plans start at around £9.99 per month (approximately £120 per year). APARI is worth investigating if you are a single-property landlord with very straightforward finances.

123 Sheets — bridging software from ~£96 per year

123 Sheets is a bridging solution, meaning it does not manage your records — it takes data you have already prepared in a spreadsheet and transmits it to HMRC's MTD API. It is HMRC-recognised and starts at around £8 per month (roughly £96 per year on an annual plan).

The trade-off is significant manual effort. You must maintain your own spreadsheet, categorise every transaction yourself using the correct SA105 field names, and ensure the spreadsheet is structured exactly as the bridging tool expects. One mis-labelled column or miscategorised expense can cause a submission failure or, worse, an incorrect figure reaching HMRC undetected.

Bridging software suits landlords who already have a meticulously maintained spreadsheet system and simply need a compliant transmission mechanism. It is not suitable for landlords who want automation, bank feeds, or AI-assisted categorisation.

DIY spreadsheet plus bridging software

The cheapest possible compliant approach: maintain your records in a free spreadsheet tool (such as Google Sheets or LibreOffice Calc) and use the lowest-cost bridging software to transmit quarterly updates. Total cost: the bridging subscription, roughly £8–12 per month.

HMRC requires that the entire record-keeping process be "digital by default", meaning no manual re-keying at any point in the chain. That is achievable with a spreadsheet-plus-bridge setup, but the responsibility for categorising income and expenses correctly sits entirely with you. If you mis-categorise mortgage interest as a property repair, you will overclaim expenses and understate your tax liability — with potential consequences including a penalty and interest.

HMRC's rules on digital record-keeping are set out at gov.uk/guidance/find-software-thats-compatible-with-making-tax-digital-for-income-tax.

Comparison: free and low-cost MTD software for landlords

The table below covers every realistic option for landlords seeking free or low-cost MTD for Income Tax software. Prices shown are indicative as at April 2026; always check the provider's website for current pricing.

Prices correct to the best of our knowledge as at April 2026. Verify current pricing directly with each provider. LandlordTaxAi Sandbox verified — see gov.uk for the current official list.

Why free MTD software may cost you more in the long run

Price-sensitivity when choosing MTD software is entirely understandable. But it is worth working through the real cost comparison before defaulting to the cheapest or most apparently free option.

The penalty maths

HMRC's points-based penalty system for MTD for Income Tax means that each missed quarterly submission earns one penalty point. Quarterly filers reach the penalty threshold at four points, at which point a £200 financial penalty is triggered. Every further missed submission after that earns an additional £200. Points expire only after 24 months of full compliance — and the clock resets to zero if you miss a further submission during that period.

A landlord who muddles through with an ill-suited free tool, misses one submission because the software failed to connect to HMRC's API, and then misses another because they were not sure whether their data was accepted could reach the penalty threshold in a single tax year. That is a £200 fine — plus the cost of their accountant's time to sort out the mess — for an issue that £19 per month of reliable software would have prevented.

Accountant time cost

Many landlords who try to economise on MTD software end up spending more on accountancy fees to correct errors. If you submit quarterly updates with incorrectly categorised expenses — putting mortgage interest in the "repairs" box, for example — your accountant will need to identify the error, advise you on the correct categorisation, and potentially guide you through an amendment process with HMRC. Accountant time at £80–150 per hour adds up quickly.

The annual cost in context

Dedicated landlord MTD software costs roughly £120–240 per year at current market rates. For a landlord earning £30,000 per year in gross rent — which is the lower end of the mandatory MTD threshold — that annual software cost represents 0.4–0.8% of gross income. Most landlords with a portfolio of that size spend more than that on a single boiler service.

A useful way to look at it: good MTD software is not an additional cost but a replacement for some of the manual January accounting time you currently spend pulling together receipts, reconciling bank statements, and filling in SA105 forms. That time has a real cost, even if it is not an invoice you pay.

For a detailed side-by-side of what the paid options actually include, read our best paid MTD software for landlords comparison.

What landlords actually need from MTD software

Before choosing any MTD tool — free, trial, or paid — it is worth knowing exactly what the software needs to do for your situation. The following checklist covers the core requirements for a UK residential landlord.

• SA105 property income categories: Your quarterly updates must use the correct income and expense categories for UK property income. These include rent received, property repairs and maintenance, letting agent fees, buildings and contents insurance, legal costs, and finance costs (mortgage interest, reported separately under Section 24).
• Digital record-keeping from day one: HMRC requires that records be kept digitally — not just that the submission is made digitally. This means your transactions must enter the system digitally, with no manual re-keying at any point. Bank CSV import or open banking connectivity satisfies this requirement.
• Quarterly submission to HMRC's MTD API: The software must be able to connect to your Government Gateway account and submit each quarterly update directly. This is the most critical technical requirement and the one that disqualifies a plain spreadsheet.
• End of Period Statement (EOPS) support: At the end of each tax year, you submit an EOPS to finalise your annual figures for each property business. Your software must support this. Not all basic or bridging tools include EOPS functionality.
• Final Declaration support: The Final Declaration replaces the old SA100 Self Assessment return and is the last step of the annual MTD cycle. Your software needs to handle this, or you will need a separate tool or accountant for that step.
• Multiple property handling: If you own more than one rental property, your software should be able to manage transactions across multiple properties and allocate expenses correctly per property or across the portfolio.
• HMRC-compatible status: The software must appear on HMRC's official compatible software list to guarantee that the submission mechanism meets HMRC's technical standards.

Run through this checklist against any free or low-cost tool you are considering. If it fails on SA105 categories, EOPS support, or Final Declaration, it is not a complete MTD solution — and you will need to supplement it with additional tools or accountant support, which erodes any cost saving.

Frequently asked questions