As of 13 August 2026, AI cannot estimate the inheritance tax on your estate.

What to actually do

1. Hand it to a person

   The route this page recommends

   Someone with a licence or accountable authority has to sign this before it counts.

2. Use a tool built for this

   Second choice

3. Do it yourself

   The distant third

   A chat interface gets you a draft, but you cannot verify it yourself. That is the catch.

   How to actually do it

   1. Open the relevant inheritance tax guidance on GOV.UK and note the tax year and rules you want the estimate to use.
   2. Gather the will, property and investment valuations, bank statements, pension and life policy details, debt statements, gift records, trust documents and any HMRC correspondence.
   3. Create a list of each asset, debt, gift and ownership arrangement, recording its date, value, owner and supporting document rather than relying on memory.
   4. Paste the completed details and the copyable prompt into a chatbot, and ask it to identify missing facts before calculating anything.
   5. Compare every tax rule, allowance, rate and source in the response with the current GOV.UK guidance you opened, and delete any figure the chatbot cannot source.
   6. Send the estate documents, the chatbot's calculation and its list of uncertainties to a UK inheritance tax specialist solicitor or tax adviser for confirmation before making estate or tax decisions.

   Prompt

   I want a preliminary estimate of UK inheritance tax for the estate described below, not a tax return or professional advice. Use only the information I provide and official GOV.UK sources that you can identify. State the relevant tax year as [tax year] and the position as at 2026-08-13.
   
   Estate details:
   - Country within the UK: [England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland]
   - Date of death, if relevant: [date or not applicable]
   - Main residence and estimated market value: [details]
   - Other property: [details and values]
   - Bank accounts, investments and business interests: [details and values]
   - Pensions and life policies: [details and values, including nominated beneficiaries if known]
   - Debts and funeral expenses: [details and amounts]
   - Gifts or other transfers made during the relevant period: [dates, recipients and values]
   - Trusts, jointly owned assets, agricultural or business property, and earlier inheritances: [details or none known]
   - Spouse or civil partner: [details]
   - Intended beneficiaries, including children or direct descendants: [details]
   - Any available wills, valuations or HMRC correspondence: [summarise or paste]
   
   Produce:
   1. A table of every figure used, its source and whether it is confirmed or assumed.
   2. A transparent calculation showing the gross estate, allowable deductions, relevant exemptions or reliefs, taxable amount and estimated tax.
   3. Separate calculations for each plausible interpretation where a missing fact could change the result.
   4. A list of missing documents and facts that could materially change the estimate.
   5. The official GOV.UK source and date for every tax rule, allowance or rate used.
   6. A clear statement of which parts you cannot determine and why.
   
   Do not invent figures, assume that an allowance or relief applies, treat a rough estimate as a filing position, or say that the result is safe to rely on. If the estate includes trusts, substantial gifts, business or agricultural assets, jointly owned property, overseas assets, disputed valuations or an unclear will, say that a UK inheritance tax specialist solicitor or tax adviser must check it.

   Open it prefilled in ChatGPT or Claude, or copy it into Gemini, which takes no prefill link.