The Short Answer
Anxiety scores PIP points through the activities it limits, not through the diagnosis. The assessment guidance names mental health as a source of limitation in engaging with other people and in planning and following journeys, and the daily living activities add prompting descriptors on top. Eight points in a component pays the standard rate and 12 pays the enhanced rate. The calculator above scores the activities that apply.
How Anxiety Scores PIP Points
Six activities carry most anxiety claims, and each one is on the list for a stated reason. The table sets out what each activity assesses, the descriptors that turn on the functions anxiety is reported to affect, and what those descriptors are worth.
| Activity | What it assesses | Descriptors typically engaged | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daily living 9 — Engaging with other people face to face | engaging with other people face to face, including whether prompting or social support is needed | b, c, d | 2–8 |
| Mobility 1 — Planning and following journeys | planning and following journeys, including journeys avoided because of overwhelming psychological distress | b, e | 4–10 |
| Daily living 10 — Making budgeting decisions | making simple and complex budgeting decisions, which turns on cognitive function | b, c | 2–4 |
| Daily living 3 — Managing therapy or monitoring a health condition | managing medication and monitoring a health condition at home | b | 1 |
| Daily living 1 — Preparing food | preparing and cooking a simple meal, including where prompting or supervision is needed | d, e | 2–4 |
| Daily living 4 — Washing and bathing | washing and bathing, including where supervision or prompting is needed | c | 2 |
Last checked: 7 August 2026
Where this mapping comes from
Descriptor letters and point values are reproduced from Schedule 1 of the Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013. The activities listed are the ones whose published assessment guidance names the functions this condition is reported to affect. No activity is listed on any other basis.
Activities are numbered as Schedule 1 numbers them, within each component: daily living 1 to 10 and mobility 1 to 2.
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 9: “This activity is designed for limitations on social engagement deriving from mental health, cognitive and learning impairments.”
- GOV.UK, Personal Independence Payment: “You do not have to have a physical disability to get the mobility part. You might also be eligible if you have difficulty getting around because of a cognitive or mental health condition, like anxiety.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 10: “The age of the person or whether they have ever done any household budgeting is irrelevant - it is their ability to make budgeting decisions and their level of cognitive function that is relevant.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 3: “Examples of therapy include physiotherapy, home dialysis and special diets where both attention to the nature and timing of food is integral in the management of the diet.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 1: “If an individual cannot cook at all because they have never needed to learn, consider their ability to carry out activities at or above waist height and their cognitive ability to use a stove or microwave if shown how.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 4: “Consideration should be given to the claimant's functional restrictions to see if they: could reasonably use an aid such as a grab rail to get in or out of an unadapted bath or shower (4B) or whether they require assistance (4E) to get in and out of an unadapted bath or shower.”
Points are added within each component, never across the two. A claim that scores 6 points on daily living and 10 on mobility receives the mobility component at the standard rate and nothing for daily living, because neither total on its own crosses its own threshold in the way the other does. The PIP points calculator scores all 12 activities where the picture is wider than the six above.
Can You Get PIP for Anxiety?
Yes, where anxiety limits the assessed activities on more than half of the days over a 12-month period. No condition qualifies by name, and none is excluded by name either. GOV.UK states the mobility position directly: "You do not have to have a physical disability to get the mobility part. You might also be eligible if you have difficulty getting around because of a cognitive or mental health condition, like anxiety."
The two tests that decide eligibility are duration and frequency. The difficulties must be expected to last at least 12 months from when they started, and must apply on more than half of the days across that period. A condition that has been present for years and limits the same activities most weeks meets both.
What Rate Could Anxiety Get?
The rate follows the points, and both components are reachable. The daily living component pays £76.70 a week at the standard rate and £114.60 at the enhanced rate. The mobility component pays £30.30 and £80.00. A claim scoring 12 points in both components receives £194.60 a week, which is £778.40 every 4 weeks.
Last checked: 6 August 2026
The journeys activity is where anxiety most often reaches the enhanced mobility rate on its own, because two of its descriptors score 10 points and one scores 12. On daily living, the pattern is usually additive: several 2-point and 4-point descriptors reaching 8 or 12 rather than one severe descriptor doing it alone.
How Overwhelming Psychological Distress Is Defined
Two activities score anxiety at its highest levels through a defined term, and the definition is narrow. The assessment guide states that overwhelming psychological distress means "distress related to a mental health condition or intellectual or cognitive impairment which results in a severe anxiety state in which the symptoms are so severe that the person is unable to function". That wording sets the bar for descriptor 9d and for the two distress descriptors in planning and following journeys.
The practical consequence is that panic attacks are evidence, not a descriptor. What the descriptor asks is whether the distress prevents the activity: whether you cannot engage with other people at all, or cannot undertake any journey. Where prompting or another person makes the activity possible, a lower descriptor applies instead — 9b for prompting, 9c for social support, and, on journeys, the 4-point prompting descriptor rather than the 10-point one.
Evidence that matches this structure describes outcomes rather than feelings. A note recording that you left an appointment before it started, or turned back from a journey, or did not answer the door, addresses the descriptor directly. A note recording that you felt anxious does not, because every descriptor above 0 points already assumes the condition is present.
The reliability criteria then apply on top. The guide requires assessors to consider whether an activity can be repeated "within a reasonable period of time and to the same standard", naming anxiety among the symptoms that bear on it. One journey completed on a good day does not answer the question the descriptor asks.
Evidence That Supports an Anxiety Claim
Evidence that names the activity beats evidence that names the diagnosis. The diagnosis is rarely in dispute; what the descriptors ask about is what happens when you try to do the task. The DWP assessment guide names anxiety among the symptoms that bear on whether an activity can be repeated "within a reasonable period of time and to the same standard", so evidence about aftermath carries weight.
- A GP record or summary printout showing the diagnosis, its duration and current treatment
- A repeat prescription list covering anxiety medication
- Letters from a community mental health team, IAPT or talking therapies service
- A care plan or crisis plan, where one exists
- A diary of the days engagement, journeys or appointments were not possible, kept over several weeks
- A written statement from someone who prompts or accompanies you, describing what they do and how often
Send what you already have rather than waiting for a new report. Evidence describing what you can do on an ordinary day answers the descriptors; the assessment weighs it against the reliability criteria.
Work Out the Full Picture
The tool above is pre-filtered; the assessment is not. All 12 activities are scored — 10 for daily living and 2 for mobility, set out in Schedule 1 of the PIP Regulations 2013 — and points from the two components never combine.
Anxiety rarely limits only the six activities above, and the assessment scores all twelve. Two tools finish the picture:
- Score every activity in the PIP points calculator, which uses the same verbatim descriptors across daily living and mobility.
- Compare the tools on the all condition calculators page, where each one is pre-filtered to a different set of activities.
If an award is already in place and was backdated, the work out your pip back pay tool prices the arrears for the period involved.
Related guidance: check pip for anxiety.