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.

Ethnic diversity in creative industries differed by sector in the United Kingdom (UK) in 2019. The IT, software, and computer services sector employed a share of 14 percent of individuals with BAME background, while the games sector counted for 10 percent of BAME employees.

  Employment within the creative industries in the UK

The number of employees in the creative industries has increased in the UK, rising from nearly 1.6 million workers in 2011 to over two million in 2018. The highest increase in the number of employees was observed within the IT, software and computer services sector, with 250 thousand more individuals employed in 2018 compared to 2011. Over the same period, the number of employees within museums, galleries, and libraries remained at similar levels.

Racism in the UK

A survey conducted by YouGov in June 2020 revealed that 44 percent of individuals in Great Britain believed that the UK was a fairly racist society, while eight percent considered the UK ‘very racist’. In addition, nearly half of the respondents over 65 years old thought that the UK was a racist society, with 43 percent saying it was a ‘fairly racist’ society and four percent believing it was a very racist one. In comparison, 47 percent of the 18-24 year old respondents thought that the UK was a fairly racist society and 14 percent believed it to be very racist.

These profiles help paint a general picture of an area by presenting a range of headline indicator data in both spreadsheet and map form to help show statistics covering demographic, economic, social and environmental datasets for each borough, alongside relevant comparator areas.

The full datasets and more information for each of the indicators are usually available on the London Datastore. A link to each of the datasets is contained in the spreadsheet and map.

Borough Profiles - Excel

On opening the spreadsheet a simple drop down box allows you to choose which borough profile you are interested in. Selecting this will display data for that borough, plus either Inner or Outer London, London and a national comparator (usually England where data is available).

To see the full set of data for all 33 local authorities in London plus the comparator areas in Excel, click the 'Data' worksheet.

A chart and a map are also available to help visualise the data for all boroughs (macros must be enabled for the Excel map to function).

The data is set out across 11 themes covering most of the key indicators relating to demographic, economic, social and environmental data. Sources are provided in the spreadsheet. Notes about the indicator are provided in comment boxes attached to the indicator names.

Profiles using interactive mapping

For a geographical and bar chart representation of the profile data, open this interactive report. Choose indicators from the left hand side. Click on the comparators to make them appear on the chart and map.

Sources, links to data, and notes are all contained in the box in the bottom right hand corner.

These profiles include data relating to: Population, Households (census), Demographics, Migrant population, Ethnicity, Language, Employment, NEET, Benefits, Qualifications, Earnings, Volunteering, Jobs density, Business Survival, Crime, Fires, House prices, New homes, Tenure, Greenspace, Recycling, Carbon Emissions, Cars, Public Transport Accessibility (PTAL), Indices of Multiple Deprivation, GCSE results, Children looked after, Children in out-of-work families, Life Expectancy, Teenage conceptions, Happiness levels, Political control, and Election turnout.

Data is correct as of September 2014.

London Borough Atlas

To access even more data at local authority level, use the London Borough Atlas. It contains data about the same topics as the profiles but provides further detailed breakdowns and time-series data for each borough.

The London boroughs are: City of London, Barking and Dagenham, Barnet, Bexley, Brent, Bromley, Camden, Croydon, Ealing, Enfield, Greenwich, Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Haringey, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Islington, Kensington and Chelsea, Kingston upon Thames, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Newham, Redbridge, Richmond upon Thames, Southwark, Sutton, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Wandsworth, Westminster.

You may also find our small area profiles useful - Ward, LSOA, and MSOA.

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).

In 2023/24 the stop and search rate for Black people in England and Wales was 22.4 searches per 1,000 people, compared with the stop and search rate for white people of six per one thousand people. People in the categories of 'other', mixed and Asian ethnic backgrounds also had a higher stop and search rate than that of the white population.

Labour market status by ethnic group, UK, published quarterly, non-seasonally adjusted. Labour Force Survey. These are official statistics in development.

In the 3 years to March 2021, black households were most likely out of all ethnic groups to have a weekly income of under £600.

In 2023/24, the arrest rate for people in England and Wales varied by self-identified ethnicity. People who identified as Black or Black British had an arrest rate of 17 per 1,000 population, compared with ten for people who identified as white, and eight who identified as Asian or Asian British.

In 2024, approximately 8.4 percent of police officers in England and Wales were from ethnic minority backgrounds, compared with 8.1 percent in 2022, and just 3.5 percent in 2005.

Rank and count of the top names for baby boys, changes in rank since the previous year and breakdown by country, region, mother's age and month of birth.

Black people were 3.5 times more likely to be detained than white people under the Mental Health Act in the year to March 2023.

As of the fourth quarter of 2024, the unemployment rate for people of white ethnicity in the United Kingdom was 3.6 percent, the lowest of the provided ethnic groups in this quarter. By contrast, the unemployment rate for people in the Pakistani ethnic group was 10.7 percent.

The Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) asks a sole adult in a random sample of households about their, or their household's, experience of crime victimisation in the previous 12 months. These are recorded in the victim form data file (VF). A wide range of questions are then asked, covering demographics and crime-related subjects such as attitudes to the police and the criminal justice system (CJS). These variables are contained within the non-victim form (NVF) data file. In 2009, the survey was extended to children aged 10-15 years old; one resident of that age range was also selected from the household and asked about their experience of crime and other related topics. The first set of children's data covered January-December 2009 and is held separately under SN 6601. From 2009-2010, the children's data cover the same period as the adult data and are included with the main study.

The Telephone-operated Crime Survey for England and Wales (TCSEW) became operational on 20 May 2020. It was a replacement for the face-to-face CSEW, which was suspended on 17 March 2020 because of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. It was set up with the intention of measuring the level of crime during the pandemic. As the pandemic continued throughout the 2020/21 survey year, questions have been raised as to whether the year ending March 2021 TCSEW is comparable with estimates produced in earlier years by the face-to-face CSEW. The ONS Comparability between the Telephone-operated Crime Survey for England and Wales and the face-to-face Crime Survey for England and Wales report explores those factors that may have a bearing on the comparability of estimates between the TCSEW and the former CSEW. These include survey design, sample design, questionnaire changes and modal changes.

More general information about the CSEW may be found on the ONS Crime Survey for England and Wales web page and for the previous BCS, from the GOV.UK BCS Methodology web page.

History - the British Crime Survey

The CSEW was formerly known as the British Crime Survey (BCS), and has been in existence since 1981. The 1982 and 1988 BCS waves were also conducted in Scotland (data held separately under SNs 4368 and 4599). Since 1993, separate Scottish Crime and Justice Surveys have been conducted. Up to 2001, the BCS was conducted biennially. From April 2001, the Office for National Statistics took over the survey and it became the CSEW. Interviewing was then carried out continually and reported on in financial year cycles. The crime reference period was altered to accommodate this.

Secure Access CSEW data
In addition to the main survey, a series of questions covering drinking behaviour, drug use, self-offending, gangs and personal security, and intimate personal violence (IPV) (including stalking and sexual victimisation) are asked of adults via a laptop-based self-completion module (questions may vary over the years). Children aged 10-15 years also complete a separate self-completion questionnaire. The questionnaires are included in the main documentation, but the data are only available under Secure Access conditions (see SN 7280), not with the main study. In addition, from 2011 onwards, lower-level geographic variables are also available under Secure Access conditions (see SN 7311).

New methodology for capping the number of incidents from 2017-18
The CSEW datasets available from 2017-18 onwards are based on a new methodology of capping the number of incidents at the 98th percentile. Incidence variables names have remained consistent with previously supplied data but due to the fact they are based on the new 98th percentile cap, and old datasets are not, comparability has been lost with years prior to 2012-2013. More information can be found in the 2017-18 User Guide (see SN 8464) and the article ‘Improving victimisation estimates derived from the Crime Survey for England and Wales’.

The self-completion modules on drinking behaviour, drugs and stolen goods are subject to restrictive controlled data access conditions - see SN 7280.

As of 2023, around 90.1 percent of court judges in England and Wales were white, with 9.9 percent from Black, Asian, mixed, or other ethnic backgrounds.

During a 2023 survey carried out among more than 3,000 marketers from the United Kingdom, 84 percent of respondents identified as white. Second largest group with 6.5 percent were marketers who identified as Asian or Asian British, followed by 1.8 percent of individuals who identified as Black, African Caribbean or Black British. The remaining 4.4 percent identified as mixed raced or belonging to multiple ethnic groups.

In 2023, there were approximately 14.69 million millennials in the United Kingdom, making it the largest generational cohort at that time. Millennials surpassed the Baby Boomer generation as the largest generation for the first time in 2019. The two youngest generations, Gen Z and Gen Alpha, numbered approximately 13.2 million, and 8.3 million respectively. Gen X are, as of the most recent year, the second-largest generation in the UK at 14.04 million people, with their parent's generation, the Silent Generation, numbering around 4.3 million people in the same year. There were estimated to be 85,920 people who belonged to the Greatest Generation, the parents of the Baby Boomer generation, who lived through major events such as the Great Depression and World War Two. Post-War Baby Boom The baby boomer generation was the largest generation for much of this period due to the spike in births that happened after the Second World War. In 1947 for example, there were over one million live births in the United Kingdom, compared with just 657,038 live births just thirty years later in 1977. Members of this generation are typically the parents of millennials, and were the driving force behind the countercultural movement of the 1960s, due to their large numbers relative to older generations at the time. The next generational cohort after Boomers are Generation X, born between 1965 and 1980. This generation had fewer members than the Boomer generation for most of its existence, and only became larger than it in 2021. Millennials and Gen Z As of 2022, the most common single year of age in the United Kingdom in 2020 was 34, with approximately 944,491 people this age. Furthermore, people aged between 30 and 34 were the most numerous age group in this year, at approximately 4.67 million people. As of 2022, people in this age group were Millennials, the large generation who came of age in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Many members of this generation entered the workforce following the 2008 financial crash, and suffered through high levels of unemployment during the early 2010s. The generation that followed Millennials, Generation Z, have also experienced tough socio-economic conditions recently, with key formative years dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and an increasingly unstable geopolitical situation.

In 2024, there were approximately 63,103 white prisoners in England and Wales, compared with 10,624 Black prisoners, and 7,067 Asian prisoners.

In 2024, 90 of the United Kingdom's 650 Members of Parliament were non-white, 66 of which were members of the Labour Party, while 15 were in the Conservative party, and five non-white MPs were members of the Liberal Democrats.

A September to November 2024 survey of UK adults aged 16 years and older found that 85 percent of respondents aged between 16 and 24 years played video games, down from a 92 percent gaming penetration among the same age group in 2020. Overall, gaming uptake increased in 2020 due to the global COVID-19 pandemic. Video games industry in the UK In 2023, consumers in the United Kingdom spent over 3.16 billion British pounds on digital and online games. In regard to the annual contribution of the video games industry to the UK Gross Domestic Product, it amounted to 3.68 billion British pounds in 2023. Mobile games The popularity of mobile gaming increased over the last decade and overtook games consoles and TV for the first time in 2014. As of 2024, approximately 34 percent of UK adults reported playing games on their mobile phone, the highest rate ever reported. The most downloaded gaming apps in the UK include puzzle and casual titles such as Supermarket Simulator and Block Blast.

In the Brexit referendum of 2016, 53 percent of white adults voted to leave the European Union, compared with 73 percent of black adults. Remain won the highest share of votes in every ethnic group, with the exception of people who identified as being white.