The mid-year estimates refer to the population on 30 June of the reference year and are produced in line with the standard United Nations (UN) definition for population estimates. They are the official set of population estimates for the UK and its constituent countries, the regions and counties of England, and local authorities and their equivalents.

In 2023, the population of the United Kingdom reached 68.3 million, compared with 67.6 million in 2022. The UK population has more than doubled since 1871 when just under 31.5 million lived in the UK and has grown by around 8.2 million since the start of the twenty-first century. For most of the twentieth century, the UK population steadily increased, with two noticeable drops in population occurring during World War One (1914-1918) and in World War Two (1939-1945). Demographic trends in postwar Britain After World War Two, Britain and many other countries in the Western world experienced a 'baby boom,' with a postwar peak of 1.02 million live births in 1947. Although the number of births fell between 1948 and 1955, they increased again between the mid-1950s and mid-1960s, with more than one million people born in 1964. Since 1964, however, the UK birth rate has fallen from 18.8 births per 1,000 people to a low of just 10.2 in 2020. As a result, the UK population has gotten significantly older, with the country's median age increasing from 37.9 years in 2001 to 40.7 years in 2022. What are the most populated areas of the UK? The vast majority of people in the UK live in England, which had a population of 57.7 million people in 2023. By comparison, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland had populations of 5.44 million, 3.13 million, and 1.9 million, respectively. Within England, South East England had the largest population, at over 9.38 million, followed by the UK's vast capital city of London, at 8.8 million. London is far larger than any other UK city in terms of urban agglomeration, with just four other cities; Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, and Glasgow, boasting populations that exceed one million people.

Annual historical data for 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.

Historical chart and dataset showing total population for the United Kingdom by year from 1950 to 2025.

The population of England was estimated to have reached almost 57.7 million in 2023, compared with 53.9 million ten years earlier in 2013. Compared with 1971, the population of England has grown by over ten million.

The total population in the United Kingdom was estimated at 69.2 million people in 2024, according to the latest census figures and projections from Trading Economics. This dataset provides the latest reported value for - United Kingdom Population - plus previous releases, historical high and low, short-term forecast and long-term prediction, economic calendar, survey consensus and news.

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).

United Kingdom UK: Population: Growth data was reported at 0.648 % in 2017. This records a decrease from the previous number of 0.714 % for 2016. United Kingdom UK: Population: Growth data is updated yearly, averaging 0.352 % from Dec 1960 (Median) to 2017, with 58 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 0.849 % in 1962 and a record low of -0.036 % in 1982. United Kingdom UK: Population: Growth data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United Kingdom – Table UK.World Bank.WDI: Population and Urbanization Statistics. Annual population growth rate for year t is the exponential rate of growth of midyear population from year t-1 to t, expressed as a percentage . Population is based on the de facto definition of population, which counts all residents regardless of legal status or citizenship.; ; Derived from total population. Population source: (1) United Nations Population Division. World Population Prospects: 2017 Revision, (2) Census reports and other statistical publications from national statistical offices, (3) Eurostat: Demographic Statistics, (4) United Nations Statistical Division. Population and Vital Statistics Reprot (various years), (5) U.S. Census Bureau: International Database, and (6) Secretariat of the Pacific Community: Statistics and Demography Programme.; Weighted average;

The statistic shows the total population in the United Kingdom from 2015 to 2019, with projections up until 2025. The population grew steadily over this period.

Population of the United Kingdom

Despite a fertility rate just below the replacement rate, the United Kingdom’s population has been slowly but steadily growing, increasing by an average of 0.6 percent every year since 2002. The age distribution has remained roughly the same for the past ten years or so, with the share of the population over 65 years old seeing a slight increase as the baby boomer generation enters into that age bracket. That share is likely to continue growing slightly, as the United Kingdom has one of the highest life expectancies in the world.

The population of the island nation is predominantly white Christians, but a steady net influx of immigrants, part of a legacy of the wide-reaching former British Empire, has helped diversify the population. One of the largest ethnic minorities in the United Kingdom is that of residents of an Indian background, born either in the UK, India, or in other parts of the world. India itself is experiencing problems with rapid population growth, causing some of its population to leave the country in order to find employment. The United Kingdom’s relatively lower levels of unemployment and the historical connection between the two countries (which has also resulted in family connections between individuals) are likely reasons that make it a popular destination for Indian emigrants.

The earliest point where scientists can make reasonable estimates for the population of global regions is around 10,000 years before the Common Era (or 12,000 years ago). Estimates suggest that Asia has consistently been the most populated continent, and the least populated continent has generally been Oceania (although it was more heavily populated than areas such as North America in very early years). Population growth was very slow, but an increase can be observed between most of the given time periods. There were, however, dips in population due to pandemics, the most notable of these being the impact of plague in Eurasia in the 14th century, and the impact of European contact with the indigenous populations of the Americas after 1492, where it took almost four centuries for the population of Latin America to return to its pre-1500 level. The world's population first reached one billion people in 1803, which also coincided with a spike in population growth, due to the onset of the demographic transition. This wave of growth first spread across the most industrially developed countries in the 19th century, and the correlation between demographic development and industrial or economic maturity continued until today, with Africa being the final major region to begin its transition in the late-1900s.

Population growth (annual %) in United Kingdom was reported at 1.066 % in 2024, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources. United Kingdom - Population growth (annual %) - actual values, historical data, forecasts and projections were sourced from the World Bank on July of 2025.

According to the 2021 Census, 62.9% (37.5 million) of the overall population of England and Wales was of ‘working age’ (between 16 and 64 years old).

In the past four centuries, the population of the United States has grown from a recorded 350 people around the Jamestown colony of Virginia in 1610, to an estimated 331 million people in 2020. The pre-colonization populations of the indigenous peoples of the Americas have proven difficult for historians to estimate, as their numbers decreased rapidly following the introduction of European diseases (namely smallpox, plague and influenza). Native Americans were also omitted from most censuses conducted before the twentieth century, therefore the actual population of what we now know as the United States would have been much higher than the official census data from before 1800, but it is unclear by how much. Population growth in the colonies throughout the eighteenth century has primarily been attributed to migration from the British Isles and the Transatlantic slave trade; however it is also difficult to assert the ethnic-makeup of the population in these years as accurate migration records were not kept until after the 1820s, at which point the importation of slaves had also been illegalized. Nineteenth century In the year 1800, it is estimated that the population across the present-day United States was around six million people, with the population in the 16 admitted states numbering at 5.3 million. Migration to the United States began to happen on a large scale in the mid-nineteenth century, with the first major waves coming from Ireland, Britain and Germany. In some aspects, this wave of mass migration balanced out the demographic impacts of the American Civil War, which was the deadliest war in U.S. history with approximately 620 thousand fatalities between 1861 and 1865. The civil war also resulted in the emancipation of around four million slaves across the south; many of whose ancestors would take part in the Great Northern Migration in the early 1900s, which saw around six million black Americans migrate away from the south in one of the largest demographic shifts in U.S. history. By the end of the nineteenth century, improvements in transport technology and increasing economic opportunities saw migration to the United States increase further, particularly from southern and Eastern Europe, and in the first decade of the 1900s the number of migrants to the U.S. exceeded one million people in some years. Twentieth and twenty-first century The U.S. population has grown steadily throughout the past 120 years, reaching one hundred million in the 1910s, two hundred million in the 1960s, and three hundred million in 2007. In the past century, the U.S. established itself as a global superpower, with the world's largest economy (by nominal GDP) and most powerful military. Involvement in foreign wars has resulted in over 620,000 further U.S. fatalities since the Civil War, and migration fell drastically during the World Wars and Great Depression; however the population continuously grew in these years as the total fertility rate remained above two births per woman, and life expectancy increased (except during the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918).

Since the Second World War, Latin America has replaced Europe as the most common point of origin for migrants, with Hispanic populations growing rapidly across the south and border states. Because of this, the proportion of non-Hispanic whites, which has been the most dominant ethnicity in the U.S. since records began, has dropped more rapidly in recent decades. Ethnic minorities also have a much higher birth rate than non-Hispanic whites, further contributing to this decline, and the share of non-Hispanic whites is expected to fall below fifty percent of the U.S. population by the mid-2000s. In 2020, the United States has the third-largest population in the world (after China and India), and the population is expected to reach four hundred million in the 2050s.

The Great Britain Historical Database has been assembled as part of the ongoing Great Britain Historical GIS Project. The project aims to trace the emergence of the north-south divide in Britain and to provide a synoptic view of the human geography of Britain at sub-county scales. Further information about the project is available on A Vision of Britain webpages, where users can browse the database's documentation system online.

These data were originally collected by the Censuses of Population for England and Wales, and for Scotland. They were computerised by the Great Britain Historical GIS Project and its collaborators. They form part of the Great Britain Historical Database, which contains a wide range of geographically-located statistics, selected to trace the emergence of the north-south divide in Britain and to provide a synoptic view of the human geography of Britain, generally at sub-county scales.

The Census of Population first gathered data on housing "density", i.e. the number of persons in each household relative to the number of rooms, in 1891, although the first year included here is 1901. In 1891, over-crowding was defined as over 2 persons per room; by 1931 this threshold had dropped to 1.5 persons; and by 1961 to 1 person per room. Up to 1931, the data for each locality and date form a table of numbers of persons against numbers of rooms, and these transcriptions sometimes exclude the rows/columns for the very largest households (see the documentation for individual tables). From 1951 onwards, simpler tables simply list numbers of households in each density category (e.g. over 1 person per room and not more than 1.5 persons).

This is a new edition. Data have been added for 1911 and 1951. Wherever possible, ID numbers have been added for counties and districts which match those used in the digital boundary data created by the GBH GIS, greatly simplifying mapping.

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.

The Great Britain Historical Database has been assembled as part of the ongoing Great Britain Historical GIS Project. The project aims to trace the emergence of the north-south divide in Britain and to provide a synoptic view of the human geography of Britain at sub-county scales. Further information about the project is available on A Vision of Britain webpages, where users can browse the database's documentation system online.

The Great Britain Historical GIS Project has also produced digitised boundary data, which can be obtained from the UK Data Service Census Support service. Further information is available at census.ukdataservice.ac.uk

Main Topics:

The Great Britain Historical Database is a large database of British nineteenth and twentieth-century statistics. Where practical the referencing of spatial units has been integrated, data for different dates have been assembled into single tables.

The Great Britain Historical Database currently contains :

• Statistics from the 1861 Census and the Registrar General's reports, 1851-1861
  
• Employment statistics from the census, 1841-1931
  
• Demographic statistics from the census, 1841-1931
  
• Mortality statistics from the Registrar General's reports, 1861-1920
  
• Marriage statistics from the Registrar General's reports, 1841-1870
  
• Trade union statistics for the Amalgamated Society of Engineers (ASE), 1851-1918
  
• Trade union statistics for the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners (ASCJ), 1863-1912
  
• Official poor law statistics, 1859-1915 and 1919-1939
  
• Wage statistics, 1845-1906
  
• Hours of work statistics, 1900-1913
  
• Small debt statistics from county courts, 1847-1913 and 1938
  

There are five tables in this part of the Great Britain Historical Database :

Rd_pop holds population totals for all registration districts in England and Wales for each census from 1841 to 1911.

Pop_chan holds details of population changes between censuses for all registration districts in England and Wales for each inter-censal period from 1851-1861 to 1901-1911.

Age_sex holds the number of males and females in 5 year age groups for all registration districts in England and Wales for each census from 1851 to 1911, and for all local government districts for each census from 1921 to 1931.

Age_1901 holds a full transcript of the number of males and females in 5 year age groups for all registration districts in England and Wales for the 1901 census with greater detail for ages 13 to 20.

Rd_gaz converts the names of registration districts which appear in the database into the forms used in the GIS.

Rd_gis holds the names and counties of registration districts as they appear in the GIS, and is used for checking names and constructing rd_gaz.

Please note: this study does not include information on named individuals and would therefore not be useful for personal family history research.

Population density (people per sq. km of land area) in United Kingdom was reported at 279 sq. Km in 2022, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources. United Kingdom - Population density (people per sq. km) - actual values, historical data, forecasts and projections were sourced from the World Bank on July of 2025.

Key information about United Kingdom population

• The United Kingdom population reached 68.3 million people in Dec 2023, compared with the previously reported figure of 67.6 million people in Dec 2022
• The data reached an all-time high of 68.3 million people in Dec 2023 and a record low of 48.9 million people in Dec 1946

CEIC shifts year-end for annual Population. The Office for National Statistics provides annual mid-year Population ending the second quarter of each year.


Further information about United Kingdom population data

• In the latest reports, United Kingdom Unemployment Rate dropped to 3.9 % in Oct 2023
• Monthly earnings of the United Kingdom population was 3,547.0 USD in Jul 2024
• United Kingdom Labour Force Participation Rate dropped to 62.8 % in Oct 2023

This table contains 30 series, with data for years 1871 - 1971 (not all combinations necessarily have data for all years), and was last released on 2012-02-16. This table contains data described by the following dimensions (Not all combinations are available): Geography (1 items: Canada ...) Birthplace (30 items: Total all countries; England and Wales; Northern Ireland; Scotland ...).

Urban population (% of total population) in United Kingdom was reported at 84.88 % in 2024, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources. United Kingdom - Urban population (% of total) - actual values, historical data, forecasts and projections were sourced from the World Bank on July of 2025.

The Census@Leicester datasets include socio-demographic data from the 2001, 2011, and 2021 Leicester censuses to enable the exploration of recent historical trends. It also includes data from the 2021 census for both Nottingham and Coventry to enable comparisons with other cities.

This online resource that can be used for teaching and research purposes by staff and students and to create a legacy for the Census@Leicester Project.