Quarterly estimates of national product, income and expenditure, sector accounts and balance of payments.

The UK economy shrank by 0.1 percent in January 2025 after growing by 0.4 percent in December. Since a huge decline in GDP in April 2020, the UK economy has gradually recovered and is now around 3.4 percent larger than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic. After the initial recovery from the pandemic, however, the UK economy has effectively flatlined, fluctuating between low growth and small contractions since January 2022. Labour banking on growth to turn around fortunes in 2025 In February 2025, just over half a year after winning the last general election, the approval rating for the new Labour government fell to a low of -48 percent. Furthermore, the Prime Minister, Keir Starmer was not only less popular than the new Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, but also the leader of the Reform Party, Nigel Farage, whose party have surged in opinion polls recently. This remarkable decline in popularity for the new government is, in some part, due to a deliberate policy of making tough decisions early. Arguably, the most damaging of these policies was the withdrawal of the winter fuel allowance for some pensioners, although other factors such as a controversy about gifts and donations also hurt the government. While Labour aims to restore the UK's economic and political credibility in the long term, they will certainly hope for some good economic news sooner rather than later. Economy bounces back in 2024 after ending 2023 in recession Due to two consecutive quarters of negative economic growth, in late 2023 the UK economy ended the year in recession. After not growing at all in the second quarter of 2023, UK GDP fell by 0.1 percent in the third quarter, and then by 0.3 percent in the last quarter. For the whole of 2023, the economy grew by 0.4 percent compared to 2022, and for 2024 is forecast to have grown by 1.1 percent. During the first two quarters of 2024, UK GDP grew by 0.7 percent, and 0.4 percent, with this relatively strong growth followed by zero percent growth in the third quarter of the year. Although the economy had started to grow again by the time of the 2024 general election, this was not enough to save the Conservative government at the time. Despite usually seen as the best party for handling the economy, the Conservative's economic competency was behind that of Labour on the eve of the 2024 election.

The gross domestic product of the United Kingdom was around 2.56 trillion British pounds, an increase when compared to the previous year, when UK GDP amounted to about 2.54 trillion pounds. The significant drop in GDP visible in 2020 was due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the smaller declines in 2008 and 2009 because of the global financial crisis of the late 2000s. Low growth problem in the UK Despite growing by 0.9 percent in 2024, and 0.4 percent in 2023 the UK economy is not that much larger than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic. Since recovering from a huge fall in GDP in the second quarter of 2020, the UK economy has alternated between periods of contraction and low growth, with the UK even in a recession at the end of 2023. While economic growth picked up somewhat in 2024, GDP per capita is lower than it was in 2022, following two years of negative growth. How big is the UK economy in relation to the rest of the world? As of 2024, the UK had the sixth-largest economy in the world, behind the United States, China, Japan, Germany, and India. Among European nations, this meant that the UK currently has the second-largest economy in Europe, although the economy of France, Europe's third-largest economy, is of a similar size. The UK's global economic ranking will likely fall in the coming years, however, with the UK's share of global GDP expected to fall from 2.16 percent in 2025 to 2.02 percent by 2029.  

Distribution and use of income account and capital account, financial account and balance sheet quarterly data for the UK total economy.

The United Kingdom's economy grew by 0.9 percent in 2024, after a growth rate of 0.4 percent in 2023, 4.8 percent in 2022, 8.6 percent in 2021, and a record 10.3 percent fall in 2020. During the provided time period, the biggest annual fall in gross domestic product before 2020 occurred in 2009, when the UK economy contracted by 4.6 percent at the height of the global financial crisis of the late 2000s. Before 2021, the year with the highest annual GDP growth rate was 1973, when the UK economy grew by 6.5 percent. UK economy growing but GDP per capita falling In 2022, the UK's GDP per capita amounted to approximately 37,371 pounds, with this falling to 37,028 pounds in 2023, and 36,977 pounds in 2024. While the UK economy as a whole grew during this time, the UK's population grew at a faster rate, resulting in the negative growth in GDP per capita. This suggests the UK economy's struggles with productivity are not only stagnating, but getting worse. The relatively poor economic performance of the UK in recent years has not gone unnoticed by the electorate, with the economy consistently seen as the most important issue for voters since 2022. Recent shocks to UK economy In the second quarter of 2020, the UK economy shrank by a record 20.3 percent at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although there was a relatively swift economic recovery initially, the economy has struggled to grow much beyond its pre-pandemic size, and was only around 3.1 percent larger in December 2024, when compared with December 2019. Although the labor market has generally been quite resilient during this time, a long twenty-month period between 2021 and 2023 saw prices rise faster than wages, and inflation surge to a high of 11.1 percent in October 2022.

Measures, analysis, and research into the digital economy key.

United Kingdom UK: GDP: saar: Statistical Discrepancy data was reported at 5,796.000 GBP mn in 2017. This records a decrease from the previous number of 8,803.000 GBP mn for 2016. United Kingdom UK: GDP: saar: Statistical Discrepancy data is updated yearly, averaging 0.000 GBP mn from Dec 1955 (Median) to 2017, with 63 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 8,803.000 GBP mn in 2016 and a record low of -1,658.000 GBP mn in 1976. United Kingdom UK: GDP: saar: Statistical Discrepancy data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by International Monetary Fund. The data is categorized under Global Database’s UK – Table UK.IMF.IFS: Gross Domestic Product: by Expenditure: Seasonally Adjusted: Annual.

Quarterly levels for UK gross domestic product (GDP) at current market prices.

Annual and quarterly data for UK GDP estimates at chained volume measures and current prices.

According to statistics published by the European Commission, the value of data economy in the 27 European Union countries and United Kingdom is estimated to exceed 440 billion euros in 2020. The source defines the data economy as representing the overall impacts of the data market on the economy as a whole. It involves the generation, collection, storage, processing, distribution, analysis elaboration, delivery, and exploitation of data enabled by digital technologies.

In May 2024, output in UK construction grew by 1.9 percent, with services growing by 0.3 percent, while production output and agriculture output both grew by 0.2 percent.

Monthly estimate of gross domestic product (GDP) containing constant price gross value added (GVA) data for the UK.

Data for statistical bulletin and National Accounts analysis

Collated set of UK socio-economic indicators from the Esri UK National Data Service. These have been made available for a limited period to support COVID-19 responses.This set of socio-economic data covers demographics, deprivation, household composition and unemployment. Sources are UK and England only including: MHCLG Index of Multiple Deprivation; ONS Population Estimates; DWP through NOMIS and 2011 Census where more up to date information is not available. The data is presented across a set of standard geographical areas from Lower Super Output Area (LSOA) to National.

Private rent price statistics, including indices, annual percentage change and price levels.