In 2024, over nine million people lived in Greater London, making it the most populated ceremonial county in England. The West Midlands Metropolitan County, which contains the large city of Birmingham, was the second-largest county at just over 3.03 million, closely followed by Greater Manchester at three million, and then West Yorkshire with a population of 2.4 million. Kent, Essex, and Hampshire were the three next-largest counties in terms of population, each with just over 1.9 million people. A patchwork of regions England is just one of the four countries that compose the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, with England, Scotland and Wales making up Great Britain. England is therefore not to be confused with Great Britain or the United Kingdom as a whole. Within England, the next subdivisions are the nine regions of England, containing various smaller units such as unitary authorities, metropolitan counties and non-metropolitan districts. The counties in this statistic, however, are based on the ceremonial counties of England as defined by the Lieutenancies Act of 1997. Regions of Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland Like England, the other countries of the United Kingdom have their own regional subdivisions, although with some different terminology. Scotland’s subdivisions are council areas, while Wales has unitary authorities, and Northern Ireland has local government districts. As of 2024, the most-populated Scottish council area was Glasgow City, with over 650,000 inhabitants. In Wales, Cardiff had the largest population among its unitary authorities, and in Northern Ireland, Belfast was the local government area with the most people living there.

In the years 1166 to 1168, a total of 6,446.15 British pounds was spent on the hiring of knights' services. The counties with the highest amount of money spent on knights' fees were Yorkshire (which is also the largest county in England), Gloucestershire and Devon. The county where the lowest amount of money was spent on hiring knights' services was Surrey, where just four pounds was spent in 1166 to 1168.

National and subnational mid-year population estimates for the UK and its constituent countries by administrative area, age and sex (including components of population change, median age and population density).

The population of the United Kingdom in 2024 was estimated to be approximately 69.3 million, with over 9.6 million people living in South East England. London had the next highest population, at almost 9.1 million people, followed by the North West England at 7.7 million. With the UK's population generally concentrated in England, most English regions have larger populations than the constituent countries of Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, which had populations of 5.5 million, 3.2 million, and 1.9 million respectively. English counties and cities The United Kingdom is a patchwork of various regional units, within England the largest of these are the regions shown here, which show how London, along with the rest of South East England had around 18 million people living there in this year. The next significant regional units in England are the 47 metropolitan and ceremonial counties. After London, the metropolitan counties of the West Midlands, Greater Manchester, and West Yorkshire were the biggest of these counties, due to covering the large urban areas of Birmingham, Manchester, and Leeds respectively. Regional divisions in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland The smaller countries that comprise the United Kingdom each have different local subdivisions. Within Scotland these are called council areas, whereas in Wales the main regional units are called unitary authorities. Scotland's largest Council Area by population is that of Glasgow City at over 650,000, while in Wales, it was the Cardiff Unitary Authority at around 384,000. Northern Ireland, on the other hand, has eleven local government districts, the largest of which is Belfast with a population of approxiamtely 352,000.

UK residents by broad country of birth and citizenship groups, broken down by UK country, local authority, unitary authority, metropolitan and London boroughs, and counties. Estimates from the Annual Population Survey.

According to the 2021 Census, London was the most ethnically diverse region in England and Wales – 63.2% of residents identified with an ethnic minority group.

As of 2024, the population density in London was by far the highest number of people per square km in the UK, at *****. Of the other regions and countries which constitute the United Kingdom, North West England was the next most densely populated area at *** people per square kilometer. Scotland, by contrast, is the most sparsely populated country or region in the United Kingdom, with only ** people per square kilometer. Countries, regions, and cities In 2024, the population of the United Kingdom reached **** million. The majority of people in the UK live in England, which had a population of **** million that year, followed by Scotland at *** million, Wales at **** million and finally Northern Ireland at just over *** million. Within England, the South East was the region with the highest population at almost *** million, followed by London at just over *****million. In terms of cities, London is the largest urban agglomeration in the United Kingdom, followed by Manchester, and then Birmingham, although both these cities combined would still have a smaller population than the UK capital. London calling London's huge size in relation to other UK cities is also reflected by its economic performance. In 2023, London's GDP was over ****billion British pounds, around a quarter of UK's overall GDP. In terms of GDP per capita, Londoners had a GDP per head of ****** pounds, compared with an average of ****** for the country as a whole. Productivity, expressed as by output per hour worked, was also far higher in London than the rest of the country. In 2023, London was around *****percent more productive than the rest of the country, with South East England the only other region where productivity was higher than the national average.

The median age of the population in London was 35.7 years in 2024, the lowest median age among regions of the United Kingdom. By contrast, South West England had a median age of 43.7, the highest in the UK.

Number of suicides, suicide rates and median registration delays, by local authority in England and Wales.

As of November 2022, Rutland Water ranked as the largest country park in England. Measuring over ***** hectares in size, Rutland Water shares part of its name from the county where it is located, Rutland, which has the distinction of being Britain's smallest county. Trailing Rutland Water as the second largest English country park was Nottinghamshire-based Clumber park, with a size of over ***** hectares.

The gross domestic product of London was approximately 569 billion British pounds in 2023, far bigger than any other major metropolitan area of the United Kingdom in that year. The metropolitan area with the second-largest GDP was Greater Manchester, at around 101.3 billion British pounds,

In 2023, the gross domestic product per capita in London was 63,618 British pounds, compared with 37,135 pounds per capita for the United Kingdom as a whole. Apart from London, the only other region of the UK that had a greater GDP per capita than the UK average was South East England, at 38,004 pounds per capita. By contrast, North East England had the lowest GDP per capita among UK regions, at 26,347 pounds. Regional imbalance in the UK economy? London's overall GDP in 2022 was over 508 billion British pounds, which accounted for almost a quarter of the overall GDP of the United Kingdom. South East England had the second-largest regional economy in the country, with a GDP of almost 341.7 billion British pounds. Furthermore, these two regions were the only ones that had higher levels of productivity (as measured by output per hour worked) than the UK average. While recent governments have recognized regional inequality as a major challenge facing the country, it may take several years for any initiatives to bear fruit. The creation of regional metro mayors across England is one of the earliest attempts at giving regions and cities in particular more power over spending in their regions than they currently have. UK economy growth slow in late 2024 After ending 2023 with two quarters of negative growth, the UK economy grew at the reasonable rate of 0.8 percent and 0.4 percent in the first and second quarters of the year. This was, however, followed by zero growth in the third quarter, and by just 0.1 percent in the last quarter of the year. Other economic indicators, such as the inflation rate, fell within the expected range in 2024, but have started to rise again, with a rate of three percent recorded in January 2025. While unemployment has witnessed a slight uptick since 2022, it is still at quite low levels compared with previous years.

In 2023, London had a gross domestic product of over 569 billion British pounds, by far the most of any region of the United Kingdom. The region of South East England which surrounds London had the second-highest GDP in this year, at over 360 billion pounds. North West England, which includes the major cities of Manchester and Liverpool, had the third-largest GDP among UK regions, at almost 250 billion pounds. Levelling Up the UK London’s economic dominance of the UK can clearly be seen when compared to the other regions of the country. In terms of GDP per capita, the gap between London and the rest of the country is striking, standing at over 63,600 pounds per person in the UK capital, compared with just over 37,100 pounds in the rest of the country. To address the economic imbalance, successive UK governments have tried to implement "levelling-up policies", which aim to boost investment and productivity in neglected areas of the country. The success of these programs going forward may depend on their scale, as it will likely take high levels of investment to reverse economic neglect regions have faced in the recent past. Overall UK GDP The gross domestic product for the whole of the United Kingdom amounted to 2.56 trillion British pounds in 2024. During this year, GDP grew by 0.9 percent, following a growth rate of 0.4 percent in 2023. Due to the overall population of the UK growing faster than the economy, however, GDP per capita in the UK fell in both 2023 and 2024. Nevertheless, the UK remains one of the world’s biggest economies, with just five countries (the United States, China, Japan, Germany, and India) having larger economies. It is it likely that several other countries will overtake the UK economy in the coming years, with Indonesia, Brazil, Russia, and Mexico all expected to have larger economies than Britain by 2050.

In the 2024/25 reporting year, Lincolnshire Police reported a homicide rate of 17.9 homicides per million people, the highest among the provided police force areas in England in that reporting year.

As of the first quarter of 2025, the claimant count rate of the West Midlands Metropolitan County was 7.7 percent, which was the highest among unitary authorities, metropolitan counties, and in London.

London had the highest crime rate among regions of the United Kingdom in 2024/25, at approximately ***** crimes per 1,000 population, followed by Yorkshire and the Humber, at ***** crimes per 1,000 people. On a more local level, the police force area with the highest crime rate in England and Wales was that of Cleveland, in North East England. Although London had the fifth-highest crime rate among police force areas, it was lower than the crime rates of the West Yorkshire, Greater Manchester, and South Yorkshire police force areas as well. Is crime in the UK rising? Between the early 2000s and the mid-2010s, crime in the UK declined quite significantly. The crime rates of England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland all fell during this time period. From around 2013/14, however the crime rate in England and Wales began to rise again, approaching levels seen in the 2000s. In Scotland and Northern Ireland crime also stopped declining at the same rate, although there was no sudden increase as seen in England and Wales. Without adjusting for population-size, the overall number of crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales reached a peak of around 6.74 million offences in 2022/23, falling slightly in the two years since then. What kinds of crime are increasing? Although overall crime levels have increased, some types of crime have continued to decline. Overall theft offences for example, are far lower than in the 2000s. This is partly due to the decline in burglaries, and vehicle theft offences. Shoplifting offences, by contrast have spiked since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching a peak of over ******* offences in 2024/25. Additionally, the number of violence against the person offences surged from 2014/15 onwards, with the number of sexual offences also at far higher levels than in the recent past.

In 2023/24, 57 percent of households in Northern Ireland were receiving a type of state benefit, the highest in the United Kingdom in that reporting year. By comparison, 39 percent of households in London were receiving benefits, the lowest in the UK.

Between 2021 and 2023, life expectancy for women in the United Kingdom was highest in the London borough of Kensington and Chelsea, at 86.46 years, while for men it was highest in Hart, at 83.44.

By 2047 the population of London is expected to reach 9.97 million people, an increase of almost 699,500 when compared with 2025. While there has been quite a steep rise in its population in recent years, London’s population growth was relatively stagnant throughout the 1980s and even decreased slightly towards the end of that decade. After peaking at 8.89 million in 2019, the population of London has fallen slightly, to 8.8 million by 2021. UK population forecast Like London, the population of the United Kingdom is forecast to continue to grow well into the middle of the century. By 2046, the population of the UK is estimated to be over 76.3 million people, an increase of over 20 million people when compared with the population figures for 1976. Additionally, the average age of the population is predicted to increase from 39.5 years in 2020 to 44.5 years by the mid-2040s, and continue to increase towards the end of the century. London looms large In the UK, London is by far the largest urban agglomeration in the country, dwarfing the UK's next largest cities of Birmingham, Manchester, and Leeds. London also has a dominant economic position in the UK, with the city accounting for around a quarter of the total GDP in the country. The UK capital also has a far higher GDP per head than the rest of the county, at over ****** pounds in 2023, compared with the UK average of ****** pounds.

In 2021, there were approximately 127 thousand Polish citizens living in England's capital, London, the most of any region. The North East of England had the lowest number of any region, at 12 thousand Polish inhabitants in 2021.