The wholesale and retail trade sector employed approximately 4.9 million people in the United Kingdom in 2024, the most of any sector in that year. After this sector, administrative, and support service activities were the largest sector employer, at almost 3.1 million.

The statistic shows the distribution of the workforce across economic sectors in the United Kingdom from 2013 to 2023. In 2023, 0.99 percent of the workforce were employed in agriculture, 17.77 percent in manufacturing and 81.25 percent in services. The same year, the total UK population amounted to about 81 million people.

Public and private sector employment, UK, published quarterly, seasonally adjusted.

There were over 33.9 million people employed in the United Kingdom in the three months to January 2025. This represented a peak for the number of people employed in the country during this provided time period. In general, the number of people employed has consistently increased, with noticeable dips in employment occurring in 2008 due to the global financial crisis, and in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Labor market hot streak in 2022 Although there was a sharp increase in the UK's unemployment rate in the aftermath of COVID-19, the UK labor market bounced back forcefully after this sudden shock. By the middle of 2022, the UK's unemployment rate had recovered to pre-pandemic levels, while the number of job vacancies in the UK reached record highs. Wage growth was, by this point, growing at a much slower rate than inflation, which peaked at 11.1 percent in October 2022. In the two years since this peak, the UK labor market has cooled slightly; with unemployment reaching 4.4 percent by December 2024, and the number of job vacancies falling to the lowest figures since May 2021. Characteristics of UK workers As of 2024, the majority of UK workers were working in the private sector, at over 27.6 million workers. In the same year the size of the UK's public sector workforce stood at approximately 6.1 million, with over two million of these people working for the UK's National Health Service (NHS), and a further 1.66 million in the public education sector. In the UK's private sector, the industry sector which employed the most people was wholesale and retail, which had a workforce of over 4.9 million people, followed by administrative and support service roles at around 3.1 million.

Quarterly estimates of UK and regional public sector employment, made up of central government, local government, and public corporations.

Estimates for gross value added (GVA), jobs and output per job by section level industry, as defined by the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC). Contains annual and quarterly statistics. Contains estimates for industry quarter-on-quarter, year-on-year and quarter-on-year contributions to output per job.

In 2024, there were over 5.05 million filled jobs in human health and social work in the United Kingdom, the most of any industry. In wholesale and retail, there were around 4.8 million filled jobs, making it the second most common industry in terms of employment.

Employees and self-employed, by industry sectors and sex, UK, published quarterly, non-seasonally adjusted. Labour Force Survey. These are official statistics in development.

Estimates of paid hours worked, weekly, hourly and annual earnings for the highest paid (90 to 99 percentiles) employee jobs in the UK, by public and private sectors.

Forecast: Employment in Real Estate Activities Sector in the UK 2024 - 2028 Discover more data with ReportLinker!

Self-employment jobs by industry and sex, UK, published quarterly, not seasonally adjusted. Labour Force Survey data are official statistics in development.

Employee jobs by industry and sex, UK, published quarterly, not seasonally adjusted.

Census 2021 industry data for people aged 16 years and older and in employment, to a detailed level (Standard Industrial Classification Group Title - 2007), is part of The occupations and industries most dependent on older and younger workers: March 2021, a release of results from the 2021 Census for England and Wales. Figures may differ slightly in future releases because of the impact of removing rounding and applying further statistical processes.

Some shorthand may be used in this workbook. Individual estimates suppressed with "[c]" relate to statistics based on a small number of respondents (< 10). Such values have been suppressed on quality grounds and to maintain confidentiality.

Armed forces personnel and defence employees are included in the census and recorded as usually resident using the standard definitions. The instructions given to personnel on how to respond to the census mean that this group cannot be reliably identified in census data on industry and occupation. Information on the size and characteristics of the UK armed forces population is produced by the Ministry of Defence (MOD).

Part-time workers are defined as those that worked 30 hours or fewer a week. Full-time workers are defined as those that worked 31 hours or more a week.

Quality assurance information can be found here

Occupation

Occupation is classified using the Standard Occupation Classification 2020 version. Details can be found here.

Industry

Industry is classified using the Standard Industrial Classifications 2007 version. Details can be found here.

Age

This is someone’s age on their last birthday on Census Day, 21 March 2021 in England and Wales.

Disabled

People who assessed their day-to-day activities as limited by long-term physical or mental health conditions or illnesses are considered disabled. This definition of a disabled person meets the harmonised standard for measuring disability and is in line with the Equality Act (2010).

Forecast: Employment in Advertising and Market Research Sector in the UK 2024 - 2028 Discover more data with ReportLinker!

Provides estimates of contributions to labour productivity, measured as output per hour (OPH), using the "Generalised Exactly Additive Decomposition" (GEAD) methodology as described in Tang and Wang (2004), UK.

Annual employee and employment estimates for Great Britain and UK split by broad industry group Standard Industrial Classification: SIC 2007. Results given by full-time or part-time and public or private splits.

Workforce jobs by industry, employee jobs by industry and self-employment jobs by industry. UK, published quarterly.