Inflation is an important measure of any country’s economy, and the Retail Price Index (RPI) is one of the most widely used indicators in the United Kingdom, with the rate expected to be 4.1 percent in 2025, compared with 3.6 percent in 2024. This followed 2022, when RPI inflation reached a rate of 11.6 percent, by far the highest annual rate during this provided time period. CPI vs RPI Although the Retail Price Index is a commonly utilized inflation indicator, the UK also uses a newer method of calculating inflation, the Consumer Price Index. The CPI, along with the CPIH (Consumer Price Index including owner occupiers' housing costs) are usually preferred by the UK government, but the RPI is still used in certain instances. Increases in rail fares for example, are calculated using the RPI, while increases in pension payments are calculated using CPI, when this is used as the uprating factor. The use of one inflation measure over the other can therefore have a significant impact on people’s lives in the UK. High inflation falls to more typical levels by 2024 Like the Retail Price Index, the Consumer Price Index inflation rate also reached a recent peak in October 2022. In that month, prices were rising by 11.1 percent and did not fall below double figures until April 2023. This fall was largely due to slower price increases in key sectors such as energy, which drove a significant amount of the 2022 wave of inflation. Inflation nevertheless remains elevated, fueled not only by high food inflation, but also by underlying core inflation. As of February 2025, the overall CPI inflation rate was 2.8 percent, although an uptick in inflation is expected later in the year, with a rate of 3.7 percent forecast for the third quarter of the year.

The inflation rate for the Retail Price Index (RPI) in the United Kingdom was 4.3 percent in May 2025, down from 4.5 percent in the previous month. From 2021 onwards, prices in the UK rose rapidly, with the RPI inflation rate peaking at 14.2 percent in October 2022. Although inflation fell in subsequent months, it wasn't until July 2023 that inflation fell below double digits, and as of late 2024, the RPI rate was still above three percent. The CPI and CPIH While the retail price index is still a popular method of calculating inflation, the consumer price index (CPI) is the current main measurement of inflation in the UK. There is also an additional price index, which includes some extra housing costs, known as the Consumer Price Index including homer occupiers' costs (CPIH) index, which is seen by the UK's Office of National Statistics as the official inflation rate. As of December 2024, the CPI inflation rate stood at 2.5 percent, while the CPIH rate was 3.5 percent. Core inflation down in 2024 Another way of measuring inflation is to strip out the volatility of energy and food prices and look at the underlying core inflation rate. As of December 2024, this was 3.2 percent, slightly higher than the overall CPI rate, but more aligned with the overall figure than it was in 2022 and 2023. When inflation peaked at 11.2 percent in October 2022, for example, core inflation stood at just 6.5 percent. After energy prices in 2023 fell relative to 2022, the overall inflation rate in the UK declined quite rapidly, with core inflation overtaking the overall rate in July 2023. During the most recent period of high inflation, core inflation peaked at 7.1 percent in May 2023, and while taking longer to fall than the overall figure, has generally been declining since then.

There are a number of differences between the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) and Retail Prices Index (RPI), including their coverage, population base, commodity measurement and methods of construction. Combined, these differences have meant that, for most of its history, the CPI has been lower than the RPI. One of the main reasons to this difference is the method of construction at the lowest level, where different formulae are used in the CPI and RPI to combine individual prices. This difference is usually referred to as the formula effect. This article will investigate similar formula effects present in the inflation measures of other countries, and where necessary will attempt to explain why the magnitude of the formula effect experienced by other countries differs from that of the UK.

Source agency: Office for National Statistics

Designation: National Statistics

Language: English

Alternative title: International Comparison

The Retail Price Index (RPI) is one of the main measures of inflation used to calculate the change in the price of goods and services within the British economy. In the first quarter of 2025 the index value was 393.7, indicating that the price for a fixed basket of goods had increased by almost 294 percent since 1987. The RPI inflation rate for March 2025 was 3.2 percent, down from 3.4 percent in the previous month. Inflation and UK living standards For UK consumers, high inflation is one of the main drivers of the ongoing cost of living crisis. With wages struggling to keep up with the pace of inflation for a long period between 2021 and 2023, UK households saw their living standards fall significantly. In 2022/23, real household disposable income in the UK is estimated to have fallen by 2.1 percent, which was the biggest fall in living standards since 1956. While there have been some signals that the crisis eased somewhat in 2024, such as falling energy and food inflation, an increasing share of UK households have reported increasing living costs since Summer 2024. Additional inflation indicators Aside from the Retail Price Index, the UK also produces other inflation indices such as the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and the Consumer Price Index including owner occupiers' housing costs (CPIH). While these particular indices measure consumer price increases slightly differently, they both provide an overall picture of rising prices. More specific inflation rates, such as by sector, are also produced, while other indices omit certain items, such as core inflation, which excludes food and energy inflation, to provide a more stable measure of inflation.

(CDID: CRFT) Month - Consumer price inflation time series Time series data for public sector finances and important fiscal aggregates, based on the new European System of Accounts 2010: ESA10 framework.

This article describes the new RPIJ measure of Consumer Price Inflation. RPIJ is a Retail Prices Index (RPI) based measure that will use a geometric (Jevons) formula in place of one type of arithmetic formula (Carli). It is being launched in response to the National Statistician's conclusion that the RPI does not meet international standards due to the use of the Carli formula in its calculation. The accompanying Excel file includes a back series for RPIJ from 1997 to 2012.

Source agency: Office for National Statistics

Designation: National Statistics

Language: English

Alternative title: New RPIJ measure of Consumer Price Inflation

Fig. 6. RPI records calculated using the intensity of magnetisation after demagnetisation at 15 mT and ARM (bottom), “S”IRM (middle) and bulk susceptibility Klf (top) as normalisers, respectively. The depth section between 3 and 6.5 m was re-sampled in 2009 to better describe the behaviour of the EMF in this depth/time interval.

Measures of monthly UK inflation data including CPIH, CPI and RPI. These tables complement the consumer price inflation time series dataset.

Establishing of appropriate normalisers for the determination of relative palaeointensities, remanences measured after a peak AF treatment of 15 mT were normalised by Klf, ARM and IRM@2000 mT. Scatter plots of the normalised RPI vs. ARM, Klf and IRM@2000 mT ("S"IRM) showing no correlation between the calculated RPIs and the applied normalisers.

In 2023, Thailand's retail price index (RPI) of cultural and recreational item retail stores was estimated at 488.56 index points, indicating a significant increase from the previous year. That same year, the overall retail price index (RPI) was calculated at around 297.1 index points.

In May 2025, the Consumer Price Index including owner occupiers' housing costs (CPIH) inflation rate of the United Kingdom was **** percent, down from *** percent in the previous month. The inflation rate fell noticeably after the COVID-19 pandemic, but rose sharply between Spring 2021 and Autumn 2022. After peaking at *** percent in October 2022, CPIH inflation declined throughout 2023 and into 2024, falling to *** percent by September of that year, before increasing again recently. Cost of living problems persist into 2025 Although it is likely that the worst of the recent inflation surge may have passed, the issues caused by it look set to linger into 2025 and beyond. While the share of households experiencing living cost rises has fallen from ** percent in August 2022, to ** percent in July 2024, this share rose towards the end of the year, with more than half of households reporting rising costs in December. Even with lower inflation, overall consumer prices have already increased by around ** percent in the last three years, rising to almost ** percent for food prices, which lower income households typically spend more of their income on. The significant increase in people relying on food banks across the UK, is evidence of the magnitude of this problem, with approximately **** million people using food banks in 2023/**. Other measure of inflation While the CPIH inflation rate displayed here is the preferred index of the UK's Office of National Statistics, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is often more prominently featured in the media in general. An older index, the Retail Price Index (RPI) is also still used by the government to calculate certain taxes, and rail fare rises. Other metrics include the core inflation rate, which measures prices increases without the volatility of food and energy costs, while price increases in goods and services can also be tracked separately. The inflation rate of individual sectors can also be measured, and as of December 2024, prices were rising fastest in the communications sector, at *** percent, with costs falling in the transport and furniture sectors.

This report analyses the real price of off-trade alcohol in the United Kingdom. The data is sourced from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) in addition to estimates by IBISWorld. The data is calculated from the components of the Retail Price Index (RPI) and is a weighted average of the off-trade beer, wine and spirits indices. The weighting is based on the weights attributed to the two indices by the ONS in the calculation of the RPI. The data represents real price changes, in that the price index is calculated relative to the price of other goods and services. Figures are annual averages over each financial year.

Meshes generated with Simmetrix SimModSuite and converted to PUMI/MDS using PUMI (d7ec4ca)

Representative items within the Consumer Prices Index including owner occupiers' housing costs, Consumer Prices Index and Retail Prices Index for the basket of goods and services.

MDS/PUMI meshes were converted to hypergraphs
(mesh elements -> graph vertices, mesh vertices -> hyperedges)
using the `testFileIO` tool from EnGPar (git hash 82fbd65).

The Regional Price Index contrasts the cost of a common basket of goods and services at a number of regional locations to the Perth metropolitan area. The RPIs were commissioned to assist with the calculation of the Western Australian State Government’s regional district allowance, and it has been used to assist in policy decision-making. Show full description

The Prices Survey Microdata include the underlying price data used by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to produce the Consumer Prices Index (CPI), the Retail Prices Index (RPI) and associated price indices. The CPI has become the main domestic measure of inflation for macroeconomic purposes in the UK. Since December 2003 it has been used for the inflation target that the Bank of England is required to achieve. The RPI is the most long-standing measure of inflation in the UK, and its uses have included the indexation of pensions, state benefits and index-linked gilts. The study also includes the data underlying the Producer Prices Index.

There are four levels of sampling for local price collection: locations/shopping areas; outlets/shops within locations; representative items/goods and services; and products and varieties (price quotes).

There are two basic price collection methods: local and central. Local collection is used for most items; prices are obtained from outlets in about 150 locations around the country. Some 110,000 quotations are obtained by this method. Normally, collectors must visit the outlet, but prices for some items may be collected by telephone. Central collection is used for items where all the prices can be collected centrally by the ONS with no field work. These prices can be further sub-divided into two categories, depending on their subsequent use: 1) central shops, where the prices are combined with prices obtained locally, and 2) central items, where the prices are used on their own to construct centrally calculated indices. There are about 130 items for which the prices are collected centrally.

The retail price data include the locations containing the shopping outlets from which the price quotes were obtained. These locations are intended to be broadly representative of a central shopping area and the areas where the local shopping population tend to live. The data also include the regions in which those shopping areas are located.

Linking to other business studies
The producer prices data contain Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR) reference numbers. These are anonymous but unique reference numbers assigned to business organisations. Their inclusion allows researchers to combine different business survey sources together. Researchers may consider applying for other business data to assist their research.

Latest edition information
For the thirty-fifth edition (May 2024), monthly Item Indices and Price Quotes data files for January to March 2024 have been added to the study.

Relative palaeointensity (RPI) stack calculated by interpolating nine published RPI records with IODP Site 379-U1533, and 90% confidence interval of resulting stack. Site IODP Site 379-U1533 RPI calculated by normalising natural remanent magnetisation (NRM) by anhysteretic remanent magnetisation (ARM) (NRM/ARM) for the alternating field (AF) demagnetisation range 20-55 mT. Each record in the stack was interpolated and normalised by their mean age increment and mean value respectively, before bootstrapping each record centred at each 1-kyr time step with a 1-ka overlapping window. RPI records used in the stack are located along the Antarctic Peninsula, the Wilkes Land Margin, and in the Ross Sea, with IODP Site 379-U1533 being the only site located in the Amundsen Sea. More details in Hopkins et al. (2024, doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2023.108460).

Definition of Hydrographic Unit based on the Sander: Environmental variable for calculating the RPI (River Fish Index) and relating to a territorial area that has been demarcated according to faunistic criteria. The perimeter concerns 17 municipalities, i.e. 24 680 ha.

Construction Output Price Indices (OPIs) from January 2014 to December 2024, UK. Summary.