Overseas entrepreneurs who want to start a company in London need permission to live and work in the UK, and the Innovator Founder visa is the main route built for that purpose. This guide sets out what the visa requires, what it costs, and where the practical pressure points lie, based on the government’s published guidance as of 21 October 2026.
What is the Innovator Founder visa for?
The visa lets people from outside the UK set up and run a business here. According to GOV.UK, the business must be new, meaning the applicant is not joining an existing trading business. It must also be innovative, viable with growth potential, and scalable, including plans to create jobs and to expand into national and international markets.
The route was formerly called the Innovator visa. For founders, the name change matters less than the test itself: the Home Office is not simply asking whether a business can pay its owner, but whether it can grow beyond a lifestyle venture. That bar sits closer to a venture-style pitch than to a standard small-business plan.
Applicants must also be able to speak, read, write and understand English, and must be at least 18 years old.
Why does an endorsing body sit at the centre of the process?
The distinctive feature of the route is that the idea has to be endorsed before the visa is granted. According to GOV.UK, the business or business idea must be assessed by an approved endorsing body, which issues an endorsement letter if the business is eligible. In other words, the Home Office relies on an outside organisation to judge commercial quality, while it handles identity, eligibility and security checks itself.
Several practical points follow:
- The endorsement has its own cost. GOV.UK states that an endorsement costs £1,000, paid to the endorsing body rather than to the government.
- The relationship continues after the visa is granted. Successful applicants must meet the endorsing body at least twice during their stay, at 12 and 24 months, at £500 per meeting.
- The endorsement can be withdrawn. If it is, the visa may be cut short.
- Funding has to be explained. For a new business, applicants must prove to the endorsing body that they have enough funding and where it comes from.
The list of approved endorsing bodies is maintained by the government and has changed over time, so founders should confirm that a body is currently approved before paying for an assessment.
How much does it cost? A worked example
The official fees are per person. According to GOV.UK, an application made from outside the UK costs £1,357, while extending or switching from inside the UK costs £1,693. The healthcare surcharge is payable as well, as part of the application. Biometric enrolment for in-UK extensions and switches carries no fee.
The table below sets out the fixed charges that GOV.UK publishes for a single founder, excluding the healthcare surcharge, whose amount is not stated here.
| Item | Applying from abroad | Switching or extending in the UK |
|---|---|---|
| Visa application fee | £1,357 | £1,693 |
| Endorsement fee | £1,000 | £1,000 |
| Subtotal at application | £2,357 | £2,693 |
| Two endorsing-body meetings (12 and 24 months) at £500 each | £1,000 | £1,000 |
| Total across the first three years | £3,357 | £3,693 |
The arithmetic is simple: £1,357 plus £1,000 is £2,357, and adding two meetings at £500 gives £3,357. For the in-UK route, £1,693 plus £1,000 is £2,693, rising to £3,693 once the meetings are included.
These figures exclude the healthcare surcharge, legal advice, translation costs and any fast-decision payment. They are also separate from the money a founder needs to put into the business itself.
How much must a founder have in the bank?
There are two separate funding tests, and they are easy to confuse.
The first is business funding. As noted above, applicants must show the endorsing body that they have enough funding for a new business and where it comes from. GOV.UK says investment funds are not required if the business is already established and was endorsed for an earlier visa, or if the business has changed and the change has been agreed with the endorsing body.
The second is personal maintenance. According to GOV.UK, applicants need to have had at least £1,270 in their bank account for 28 consecutive days before they apply. The same 28-day requirement applies before extending or switching if the person has been in the UK for less than a year. Investment funds cannot be counted towards it, and nor can money earned from working in the UK illegally.
What about a family?
Partners and children can apply as dependants, if eligible, and each must pay the visa fee and apply separately. GOV.UK sets out additional maintenance funds: £285 for a partner, £315 for the first child and £200 for each additional child, held for at least 28 days before they apply.
For an illustrative family of four, a founder, a partner and two children, the maintenance requirement would be £1,270 plus £285 plus £315 plus £200, which comes to £2,070. That is a personal-savings figure only; it sits on top of the fees and the capital the business itself needs.
Can someone already in the UK switch?
Some people can. GOV.UK says people already in the UK on a different visa may be able to switch if they meet the eligibility requirements, and it must be done before the current visa expires. A Student visa holder, for example, can switch after completing their sponsored course, or while studying a full-time PhD and having done so for at least 24 months.
Several categories cannot switch, including visit visas, short-term student visas, Parent of a Child Student visas, seasonal worker visas, domestic worker in a private household visas, immigration bail, and permission to stay outside the immigration rules.
Timing and travel discipline matter. Applicants who leave the UK, Ireland, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man before a decision risk having the application withdrawn. Partners and children do not switch automatically: they must apply at the same time or before their own visa expires.
For London, this switching route is arguably the most relevant. The capital’s universities produce a steady flow of international graduates, and some of them will have a business idea by the time their study visa nears its end. Anyone in that position needs to line up the endorsement, savings and application dates well ahead.
How long does it last, and what happens at the end?
According to GOV.UK, the initial stay is three years, whether the founder enters on this visa or switches to it in the UK. It can be extended for a further three years, with no limit on the number of extensions. Extending means the business or idea must be assessed by an endorsing body again, and the founder must still be running a business in the UK or want to set up a new one. Applications should be made before the current visa expires; those made in time allow the person to stay in the UK until a decision.
On settlement, GOV.UK says a founder may be able to apply for indefinite leave to remain after three years in the UK, if they meet the other eligibility requirements. Those requirements are set out in the immigration rules rather than on the summary pages, so a founder planning around settlement should read them closely.
How long do decisions take?
GOV.UK gives usual processing times of three weeks for applications made outside the UK and eight weeks for those made inside the UK. It adds that a faster decision may be available for a fee. For extensions, the decision can take longer if supporting documents need verifying, if an interview is required, or because of personal circumstances such as a criminal conviction.
The visa timetable is only one part of the schedule. A founder also needs time to secure an endorsement, to build up 28 days of qualifying savings, and to line up premises, a bank account and company registration. Those steps tend to be the real bottleneck, and they interact: the endorsing body will want evidence of funding, and the savings test excludes investment funds.
What else do founders need to get right in London?
The immigration route is one layer of a wider set of obligations. Once a company exists, directors face their own compliance duties, including identity verification at Companies House; the magazine has set out what director ID verification requires from November 2026.
On funding, many overseas founders look at domestic support alongside their own capital. The magazine’s guide to how government-backed Start Up Loans work for London founders explains one such option, though eligibility for any scheme depends on the individual’s circumstances and immigration status.
Founders weighing where to base themselves can also read about what London’s startup ecosystem looks like beyond big tech and why London continues to attract entrepreneurs, which cover the commercial case for the capital that sits behind the paperwork.
A route built around credibility, not just capital
The Innovator Founder visa rewards founders who can demonstrate three things: a genuinely new and scalable business, credible funding, and enough personal savings to live on. The fixed costs published by GOV.UK add up to a few thousand pounds per founder before dependants, advisers and the healthcare surcharge, and the endorsement relationship continues for the life of the visa.
For London, the visa is a pipeline for talent that might otherwise build elsewhere. For individual founders, the sensible approach is to treat the endorsement as the main hurdle, to plan the savings test early, and to check current guidance before each step, since fees, endorsing bodies and rules are updated from time to time.
This article is general information, not immigration, legal or financial advice. Rules and fees change, so check current GOV.UK guidance or take qualified advice before applying.
Sources: GOV.UK
