The new Sunday Times Rich List, detailing the wealthiest people in Britain, has just dropped and highlights that King Charles' personal fortune has shot all the way up since last year, and now sits at nearly double that of his mother's, Queen Elizabeth II.
King Charles' personal fortune (so not including the crown estate) is said to be £640 million, thanks to a successful investment portfolio that he inherited from the late Queen, featuring private estates like Balmoral and Sandringham. In total, since last year's list, King Charles has seen a £30m boost to his income and he is now ranked 238th in the top dog pecking order.
At the time of her death, Queen Elizabeth II's finances saw her personal net worth sitting at £330m.
Thanks to his increase in private income, the King's net worth is now in line with that of former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and his wife, Akshata Murthy, whose father is a billionaire.
Murthy was found to have partially avoided paying up to £2.1m in tax via a non-domiciled loophole in 2022, which the Labour government abolished as of April 2025. 'Non-dom' is used to refer to a UK resident who lists their permanent home as being outside of the country, typically for tax avoidant purposes.
There has been a drop in the number of billionaires on the Rich List, which some have theorised could be due to the closure of said non-dom loophole.
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Elsewhere on the list, it's revealed that singer Dua Lipa and reality star Georgia Toffolo also rank highly.
It's worth mentioning that wealth inequality in the UK has been rising since the 1980s, with the Equality Trust stating that the top fifth of people in the country take home 36% of all the income and have two-thirds of the country's total wealth between them, meanwhile the bottom fifth have only 8% of the income and only 0.5% of the wealth (as per the Office for National Statistics).
Many are calling for higher taxation to the country's most wealthy in order to try and level the playing field and restore better public services, such as the NHS and school system. Others refer to this idea as 'envy politics' and say higher taxation of the wealthy causes them to move elsewhere, removing their contributions into the tax system entirely.
The Equality Trust says the growing wealth disparity in the UK is down to a combination of factors, including technology, political systems and generational/inherited wealth. "Much of our inequality of wealth and power is entrenched by political choices made due to the incentives of our unequal system," it writes.
Jennifer Savin is Cosmopolitan UK's multiple award-winning Features Editor, who was crowned Digital Journalist of the Year for her work tackling the issues most important to young women. She regularly covers breaking news, cultural trends, health, the royals and more, using her esteemed connections to access the best experts along the way. She's grilled everyone from high-profile politicians to A-list celebrities, and has sensitively interviewed hundreds of people about their real life stories. In addition to this, Jennifer is widely known for her own undercover investigations and campaign work, which includes successfully petitioning the government for change around topics like abortion rights and image-based sexual abuse. Jennifer is also a published author, documentary consultant (helping to create BBC’s Deepfake Porn: Could You Be Next?) and a patron for Y.E.S. (a youth services charity). Alongside Cosmopolitan, Jennifer has written for The Times, Women’s Health, ELLE and numerous other publications, appeared on podcasts, and spoken on (and hosted) panels for the Women of the World Festival, the University of Manchester and more. In her spare time, Jennifer is a big fan of lipstick, leopard print and over-ordering at dinner. Follow Jennifer on Instagram, X or LinkedIn.
