There were approximately 181 thousand Pakistanis nationals residing in the United Kingdom in 2021, compared with the 189 thousand Pakistani nationals residing in the United Kingdom in 2008.
In 2011, 87.2 percent of the total population of the United Kingdom were white British. A positive net migration in recent years combined with the resultant international relationships following the wide-reaching former British Empire has contributed to an increasingly diverse population.
Varied ethnic backgrounds
Black British citizens, with African and/or African-Caribbean ancestry, are the largest ethnic minority population, at three percent of the total population. Indian Britons are one of the largest overseas communities of the Indian diaspora and make up 2.3 percent of the total UK population. Pakistani British citizens, who make up almost two percent of the UK population, have one of the highest levels of home ownership in Britain.
Racism in the United Kingdom
Though it has decreased in comparison to the previous century, the UK has seen an increase in racial prejudice during the first decade and a half of this century. Racism and discrimination continues to be part of daily life for Britain’s ethnic minorities, especially in terms of work, housing, and health issues. Moreover, the number of hate crimes motivated by race reported since 2012 has increased, and in 2017/18, there were 3,368 recorded offenses of racially or religiously aggravated assault with injury, almost a thousand more than in 2013/14.
In 1800, the population of the area of modern-day Pakistan was estimated to be just over 13 million. Population growth in the 19th century would be gradual in the region, rising to just 19 million at the turn of the century. In the early 1800s, the British Empire slowly consolidated power in the region, eventually controlling the region of Pakistan from the mid-19th century onwards, as part of the British Raj. From the 1930s on, the population's growth rate would increase as improvements in healthcare (particularly vaccination) and sanitation would lead to lower infant mortality rates and higher life expectancy. Independence In 1947, the Muslim-majority country of Pakistan gained independence from Britain, and split from the Hindu-majority country of India. In the next few years, upwards of ten million people migrated between the two nations, during a period that was blemished by widespread atrocities on both sides. Throughout this time, the region of Bangladesh was also a part Pakistan (as it also had a Muslim majority), known as East Pakistan; internal disputes between the two regions were persistent for over two decades, until 1971, when a short but bloody civil war resulted in Bangladesh's independence. Political disputes between Pakistan and India also created tension in the first few decades of independence, even boiling over into some relatively small-scale conflicts, although there was some economic progress and improvements in quality of life for Pakistan's citizens. The late 20th century was also characterized by several attempts to become democratic, but with intermittent periods of military rule. Between independence and the end of the century, Pakistan's population had grown more than four times in total. Pakistan today Since 2008, Pakistan has been a functioning democracy, with an emerging economy and increasing international prominence. Despite the emergence of a successful middle-class, this is prosperity is not reflected in all areas of the population as almost a quarter still live in poverty, and Pakistan ranks in the bottom 20% of countries according to the Human Development Index. In 2020, Pakistan is thought to have a total population of over 220 million people, making it the fifth-most populous country in the world.
Population density per pixel at 100 metre resolution. WorldPop provides estimates of numbers of people residing in each 100x100m grid cell for every low and middle income country. Through ingegrating cencus, survey, satellite and GIS datasets in a flexible machine-learning framework, high resolution maps of population counts and densities for 2000-2020 are produced, along with accompanying metadata.
DATASET: Alpha version 2010 and 2015 estimates of numbers of people per grid square, with national totals adjusted to match UN population division estimates (http://esa.un.org/wpp/) and remaining unadjusted.
REGION: Africa
SPATIAL RESOLUTION: 0.000833333 decimal degrees (approx 100m at the equator)
PROJECTION: Geographic, WGS84
UNITS: Estimated persons per grid square
MAPPING APPROACH: Land cover based, as described in: Linard, C., Gilbert, M., Snow, R.W., Noor, A.M. and Tatem, A.J., 2012, Population distribution, settlement patterns and accessibility across Africa in 2010, PLoS ONE, 7(2): e31743.
FORMAT: Geotiff (zipped using 7-zip (open access tool): www.7-zip.org)
FILENAMES: Example - AGO10adjv4.tif = Angola (AGO) population count map for 2010 (10) adjusted to match UN national estimates (adj), version 4 (v4). Population maps are updated to new versions when improved census or other input data become available.
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
Population density per pixel at 100 metre resolution. WorldPop provides estimates of numbers of people residing in each 100x100m grid cell for every low and middle income country. Through ingegrating cencus, survey, satellite and GIS datasets in a flexible machine-learning framework, high resolution maps of population counts and densities for 2000-2020 are produced, along with accompanying metadata.
DATASET: Alpha version 2010 and 2015 estimates of numbers of people per grid square, with national totals adjusted to match UN population division estimates (http://esa.un.org/wpp/) and remaining unadjusted.
REGION: Africa
SPATIAL RESOLUTION: 0.000833333 decimal degrees (approx 100m at the equator)
PROJECTION: Geographic, WGS84
UNITS: Estimated persons per grid square
MAPPING APPROACH: Land cover based, as described in: Linard, C., Gilbert, M., Snow, R.W., Noor, A.M. and Tatem, A.J., 2012, Population distribution, settlement patterns and accessibility across Africa in 2010, PLoS ONE, 7(2): e31743.
FORMAT: Geotiff (zipped using 7-zip (open access tool): www.7-zip.org)
FILENAMES: Example - AGO10adjv4.tif = Angola (AGO) population count map for 2010 (10) adjusted to match UN national estimates (adj), version 4 (v4). Population maps are updated to new versions when improved census or other input data become available.
DATASET: Alpha version 2010 and 2015 estimates of numbers of people per grid square, with national totals adjusted to match UN population division estimates (http://esa.un.org/wpp/) and remaining unadjusted. REGION: Asia SPATIAL RESOLUTION: 0.000833333 decimal degrees (approx 100m at the equator) PROJECTION: Geographic, WGS84 UNITS: Estimated persons per grid square MAPPING APPROACH: Land cover based, as described in: Gaughan AE, Stevens FR, Linard C, Jia P and Tatem AJ, 2013, High resolution population distribution maps for Southeast Asia in 2010 and 2015, PLoS ONE, 8(2): e55882 FORMAT: Geotiff (zipped using 7-zip (open access tool): www.7-zip.org) FILENAMES: Example - VNM_popmap10adj_v2.tif = Vietnam (VNM) population count map for 2010 (popmap10) adjusted to match UN national estimates (adj), version 2 (v2). DATE OF PRODUCTION: January 2013
In 2020/21 there were approximately 696,000 Polish nationals living in the United Kingdom, the highest non-British population at this time. Indian and Irish were the joint second-largest nationalities at approximately 370,000 people.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
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In 2022, the highest and lowest rates of economic inactivity were in the combined Pakistani and Bangladeshi (33%) and white 'other’ (15%) ethnic groups.
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
Historical chart and dataset showing U.K. birth rate by year from 1950 to 2025.
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
BackgroundNumerous risk prediction algorithms based on conventional risk factors for Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) are available but provide only modest discrimination. The inclusion of genetic information may improve clinical utility.MethodsWe tested the use of two gene scores (GS) in the prospective second Northwick Park Heart Study (NPHSII) of 2775 healthy UK men (284 cases), and Pakistani case-control studies from Islamabad/Rawalpindi (321 cases/228 controls) and Lahore (414 cases/219 controls). The 19-SNP GS included SNPs in loci identified by GWAS and candidate gene studies, while the 13-SNP GS only included SNPs in loci identified by the CARDIoGRAMplusC4D consortium.ResultsIn NPHSII, the mean of both gene scores was higher in those who went on to develop CHD over 13.5 years of follow-up (19-SNP p=0.01, 13-SNP p=7x10-3). In combination with the Framingham algorithm the GSs appeared to show improvement in discrimination (increase in area under the ROC curve, 19-SNP p=0.48, 13-SNP p=0.82) and risk classification (net reclassification improvement (NRI), 19-SNP p=0.28, 13-SNP p=0.42) compared to the Framingham algorithm alone, but these were not statistically significant. When considering only individuals who moved up a risk category with inclusion of the GS, the improvement in risk classification was statistically significant (19-SNP p=0.01, 13-SNP p=0.04). In the Pakistani samples, risk allele frequencies were significantly lower compared to NPHSII for 13/19 SNPs. In the Islamabad study, the mean gene score was higher in cases than controls only for the 13-SNP GS (2.24 v 2.34, p=0.04). There was no association with CHD and either score in the Lahore study.ConclusionThe performance of both GSs showed potential clinical utility in European men but much less utility in subjects from Pakistan, suggesting that a different set of risk loci or SNPs may be required for risk prediction in the South Asian population.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
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39.8% of workers from the Indian ethnic group were in 'professional' jobs in 2021 – the highest percentage out of all ethnic groups in this role.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
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70% of White British households owned their own homes – the highest percentage out of all ethnic groups.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
License information was derived automatically
In the 3 years to March 2021, white British families were the most likely to receive a type of state support.
As of the first quarter of 2025, the unemployment rate for people of white ethnicity in the United Kingdom was 3.7 percent, the lowest of the provided ethnic groups in this quarter. By contrast, the unemployment rate for people in the Pakistani ethnic group was 13.1 percent.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
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An average of 79% of Bangladeshi households were in the 2 lowest income quintiles (after housing costs were deducted) between April 2019 and March 2022
In 2025, roughly 395 thousand doctors were registered in the United Kingdom (UK). Of these, around 180 thousand were white, while the largest ethnicity of UK doctors other than white was Asian or Asian British. Some 129 thousand doctors reported so. This is unsurprising considering the most common foreign country of medical qualification is India, followed by Pakistan. As of 2024, there were more doctors of ethnic minorities than white doctors in the UK.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
License information was derived automatically
In the combined Pakistani and Bangladeshi ethnic group in 2021, 16.2% of workers were self-employed, which is the highest percentage out of all ethnic groups.
Over ****** Pakistani nationals applied for asylum in the United Kingdom in 2024, the most of any nationality. Asylum seekers from Afghanistan made up the second-highest nationality, at over *****.
In 2024, over ****** working visas granted for workers from India, the most of any nationality. Workers from Pakistan were granted more than ****** visas in the same year and were the second-most common nationality for visas being granted.
Islam is the major religion in many African countries, especially in the north of the continent. In Comoros, Libya, Western Sahara, at least 99 percent of the population was Muslim as of 202. These were the highest percentages on the continent. However, also in many other African nations, the majority of the population was Muslim. In Egypt, for instance, Islam was the religion of 79 percent of the people. Islam and other religions in Africa Africa accounts for an important share of the world’s Muslim population. As of 2019, 16 percent of the Muslims worldwide lived in Sub-Saharan Africa, while 20 percent of them lived in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Together with Christianity, Islam is the most common religious affiliation in Africa, followed by several traditional African religions. Although to a smaller extent, numerous other religions are practiced on the continent: these include Judaism, the Baha’i Faith, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Number of Muslims worldwide Islam is one of the most widespread religions in the world. There are approximately 1.9 billion Muslims globally, with the largest Muslim communities living in the Asia-Pacific region. Specifically, Indonesia hosts the highest number of Muslims worldwide, amounting to over 200 million, followed by India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Islam is also present in Europe and America. The largest Islamic communities in Europe are in France (5.72 million), Germany (4.95 million), and the United Kingdom (4.13 million). In the United States, there is an estimated number of around 3.45 million Muslims.
There were approximately 181 thousand Pakistanis nationals residing in the United Kingdom in 2021, compared with the 189 thousand Pakistani nationals residing in the United Kingdom in 2008.