In 2024, agriculture contributed around 0.56 percent to the United Kingdom’s GDP, 16.74 percent came from the manufacturing industry, and 72.79 percent from the services sector. The UK is not a farmer’s marketThe vast majority of the UK’s GDP is generated by the services sector, and tourism in particular keeps the economy going. In 2017, almost 214 billion British Pounds were contributed to the GDP through travel and tourism – about 277 billion U.S. dollars – and the forecasts see an upwards trend. For comparison, only an estimated 10.3 billion GBP were generated by the agriculture sector in the same year. But is it a tourist’s destination still? Though forecasts are not in yet, it is unclear whether travel and tourism can keep the UK’s economy afloat in the future, especially after Brexit and all its consequences. Higher travel costs, having to wait for visas, and overall more complicated travel arrangements are just some of the concerns tourists have when considering vacationing in the UK after Brexit. Consequences of the referendum are already observable in the domestic travel industry: In 2017, about 37 percent of British travelers said Brexit caused them to cut their holidays short by a few days, and about 14 percent said they did not leave the UK for their holidays because of it.

There were around *** million private sector businesses operating in the United Kingdom in 2024, with ******* of these being construction businesses and a further ******* professional, scientific, and technical businesses. The overall number of businesses in the UK reached a peak of **** million in 2020, but fell quite sharply to **** million following the COVID-19 pandemic. UK business confidence muted in 2025 Several metrics suggest UK businesses are operating in a tough environment in 2025. Business confidence has generally declined since 2022, with many firms pointing to an increased tax burden as one of their main challenges. Inflation remains a major concern too, with elevated prices remaining in place from the inflation crisis, and expected to rise further in 2025. This challenging environment may also cause firms to think twice when it comes to hiring, with the UK labor market starting to show signs of this happening already. Labor market cooldown well underway A survey from Spring 2025 that asked businesses about their employment intentions revealed that ** percent of firms intended to reduce their staff levels, the highest share in that survey since 2020. The number of job vacancies in the UK has also continued to fall, with just ******* in June 2025. This was the fewest number of vacancies since April 2021, and outside the pandemic, the lowest since May 2015. The number of employees on UK payrolls has also declined recently, with the pace of this reduction accelerating since the start of the year.

As of the second quarter of 2025, there were estimated to be 137,000 job vacancies in the human health and social work activities industry sector in the United Kingdom, the most of any industry. The sector with the fewest number of job vacancies in this month was mining and quarrying, with only one thousand estimated vacancies.

Annual employee and employment estimates for Great Britain and UK split by two, three and five-digit Standard Industrial Classification: SIC 2007. Results given by full-time or part-time and public or private splits.

Lists current and former public sector bodies – updated to incorporate classification decisions made.

Numbers of enterprises and local units produced from a snapshot of the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR) taken on 8 March 2024.

A list of the data sources that currently feed into the Quarterly Sector Accounts and UK Economic Accounts tables.

In 2024, there were approximately 870,040 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the construction sector in the United Kingdom, the most of any sector in that year. The sector with the second-highest number of SMEs was the Professional, Scientific and Technical activities sector, at 754,520 SMEs.

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

This is the ONS Postcode Directory (ONSPD) for the United Kingdom as at February 2024 in Comma Separated Variable (CSV) and ASCII text (TXT) formats. This file contains the multi CSVs so that postcode areas can be opened in MS Excel. To download the zip file click the Download button. The ONSPD relates both current and terminated postcodes in the United Kingdom to a range of current statutory administrative, electoral, health and other area geographies. It also links postcodes to pre-2002 health areas, 1991 Census enumeration districts for England and Wales, 2001 Census Output Areas (OA) and Super Output Areas (SOA) for England and Wales, 2001 Census OAs and SOAs for Northern Ireland and 2001 Census OAs and Data Zones (DZ) for Scotland. It now contains 2021 Census OAs and SOAs for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It helps support the production of area-based statistics from postcoded data. The ONSPD is produced by ONS Geography, who provide geographic support to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and geographic services used by other organisations. The ONSPD is issued quarterly. (File size - 231 MB) Please note that this product contains Royal Mail, Gridlink, LPS (Northern Ireland), Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.

United Kingdom UK: Stocks Traded: Total Value data was reported at 2,357.017 USD bn in 2014. This records an increase from the previous number of 1,675.053 USD bn for 2013. United Kingdom UK: Stocks Traded: Total Value data is updated yearly, averaging 487.920 USD bn from Dec 1975 (Median) to 2014, with 40 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 3,947.700 USD bn in 2007 and a record low of 19.361 USD bn in 1977. United Kingdom UK: Stocks Traded: Total Value 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: Financial Sector. The value of shares traded is the total number of shares traded, both domestic and foreign, multiplied by their respective matching prices. Figures are single counted (only one side of the transaction is considered). Companies admitted to listing and admitted to trading are included in the data. Data are end of year values converted to U.S. dollars using corresponding year-end foreign exchange rates.; ; World Federation of Exchanges database.; Sum; Stock market data were previously sourced from Standard & Poor's until they discontinued their 'Global Stock Markets Factbook' and database in April 2013. Time series have been replaced in December 2015 with data from the World Federation of Exchanges and may differ from the previous S&P definitions and methodology.

United Kingdom UK: Number of Listed Domestic Companies: Total data was reported at 1,858.000 Unit in 2014. This records an increase from the previous number of 1,857.000 Unit for 2013. United Kingdom UK: Number of Listed Domestic Companies: Total data is updated yearly, averaging 2,198.000 Unit from Dec 1975 (Median) to 2014, with 40 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 2,913.000 Unit in 2006 and a record low of 1,747.000 Unit in 1994. United Kingdom UK: Number of Listed Domestic Companies: Total 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: Financial Sector. Listed domestic companies, including foreign companies which are exclusively listed, are those which have shares listed on an exchange at the end of the year. Investment funds, unit trusts, and companies whose only business goal is to hold shares of other listed companies, such as holding companies and investment companies, regardless of their legal status, are excluded. A company with several classes of shares is counted once. Only companies admitted to listing on the exchange are included.; ; World Federation of Exchanges database.; Sum; Stock market data were previously sourced from Standard & Poor's until they discontinued their 'Global Stock Markets Factbook' and database in April 2013. Time series have been replaced in December 2015 with data from the World Federation of Exchanges and may differ from the previous S&P definitions and methodology.

As of February 2025, Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc was the leading company in the industrial goods and services sector on the London Stock Exchange (LSE), with a market capitalization of ** billion British pounds. Second on the list was CRH Plc, with a value of **** billion British pounds.

A list of fast facts on the performance of each sector of the UK economy.

Compass Group had by far the highest number of global employees among companies based in the United Kingdom as of 2025, at approximately 500,000 employees. Tesco had the second-highest number of employees at around 336,400, followed by HSBC Holdings which had 211,000 employees. In the same year, HSBC Holdings had an annual revenue of 142.3 billion U.S. dollars, the third-highest among UK-based companies. The oil and gas giant Shell had the highest annual revenue at over 283 billion dollars, ahead of BP at 189 billion dollars. How many businesses are there in the UK? In 2024, there were approximately 5.5 million business enterprises in the UK, down from a peak of 5.98 million in 2020. Although there were just 1,930 large firms that employed 1,000 people or more, these firms employed more than a quarter of the UK's private sector workforce, and made a combined turnover of approximately 1.69 trillion British pounds. As of this year, the construction industry had the highest number of enterprises by sector, at over 870,000. The sector with the most workers was that of wholesale and retail, which collectively employed just under 4.9 million people in 2024, and also had the highest turnover compared to other sectors, at over 1.8 trillion pounds. Current UK economic climate Although the UK economy is expected to grow in 2025, growth has been downgraded from earlier forecasts, while inflation and unemployment are expected to be higher than initially thought. According to the business confidence index, sentiment among businesses at the end of 2024 was lower than it has been since early 2021. Furthermore, since the start of 2025, businesses have been shedding jobs at an accelerating rate, possibly due to recent tax rises, which was seen as the main external concern of businesses in early 2025. The precarious state of the UK's government finances, and potential tax rises in the next budget, are also likely feeding into this pessimistic mood.

The National Health Service (NHS) had around 2.06 million employees as of the first quarter of 2025, making it the largest public sector employer in the United Kingdom. In the same quarter, 1.66 million people worked in education, the second-largest industry in terms of public sector employees.