Business births and deaths, UK
The deaths for 2023 and 2024 are provisional
Enterprises born and enterprises that died in the UK each year, with the number of active enterprises and each nation's births and deaths in the latest year, from the ONS's business demography.
Business births
317,440
2024 · 280,370 deaths; 2,859,535 active enterprises
Verified against source, 9 November 2026, 15:03 UTC- Births
- Deaths
Source: Office for National Statistics. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Data table
6 periods, newest first
| Period | Births | Deaths |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 317,440 | 280,370 (an adjustment has been made to the latest two years deaths to allow for reactivations. These figures are provisional and subject to revision.) |
| 2023 | 316,025 | 309,680 (an adjustment has been made to the latest two years deaths to allow for reactivations. These figures are provisional and subject to revision.) |
| 2022 | 336,925 | 348,675 |
| 2021 | 363,995 | 328,495 |
| 2020 | 333,020 | 300,475 |
| 2019 | 363,825 | 303,495 |
Source and licence
- Publisher
- Office for National Statistics
- Check it yourself
- https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/business/activitysizeandlocation/datasets/businessdemographyreferencetable
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0 – Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Retrieved
- 9 November 2026, 14:48 UTC
- Raw files fetched
- https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/business/activitysizeandlocation/datasets/businessdemographyreferencetable/dataSHA-256 cba60b15a60ff4d7c54a4d21a0c398ccaa4e33b50d0e90c967f5d798f56da93d · 1,573 bytes
- https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/business/activitysizeandlocation/datasets/businessdemographyreferencetable/current/dataSHA-256 08832afedbc903d980361ff9f6d9ea598cff5947ae900be0a815702a3182bf30 · 5,325 bytes
- https://www.ons.gov.uk/file?uri=/businessindustryandtrade/business/activitysizeandlocation/datasets/businessdemographyreferencetable/current/businessdemographyexceltables2024.xlsxSHA-256 0fb28dd84facf1c40d5e37b954aa6a1c41e3d8d9859fa558e5e4862a7aa45015 · 801,292 bytes
Verification
Verified against source, 9 November 2026, 15:03 UTC Run at 9 November 2026, 15:03 UTC; 12 of 12 figures matched the live source.
| Result | Check | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Pass | Provenance recorded | Office for National Statistics; Open Government Licence v3.0; retrieved 2026-11-09T14:48:40Z; 3 raw file(s) |
| Pass | Raw files match recorded SHA-256 | 3 of 3 files intact |
| Pass | Re-parsing raw files reproduces figures | 12 of 12 figures and the headline reproduced; the meta's accreditation and active and nations and flags match |
| Pass | Figures are finite numbers | 12 figures, 0 invalid |
| Pass | Live source matches every figure | 12 of 12 figures match exactly after downloading 3 source file(s) again (3 byte-identical); the headline matches; the meta's accreditation and active and nations and flags match |
| Pass | ONS edition is current | the current edition counts at 2024-12-31, 678 days before retrieval (limit 750) |
| Pass | The survival tables' births agree | 5 of 5 years' UK births match the survival tables 5.1a to 5.1e |
| Pass | The nations add up to the UK | 18 of 18 cases of the measures' years have England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland adding up to the UK |
| Not run | Source page answers | https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/business/activitysizeandlocation/datasets/businessdemographyreferencetable refuses automated requests (rate limiting, HTTP 429); open it in a browser to compare |
Notes
- Enterprises on the Inter-Departmental Business Register, counted by the ONS when they first appear (births) and when they cease to trade (deaths); each count is rounded to the nearest five, so the nations add up to the UK.
- The ONS adjusts the latest two years' deaths to allow for businesses that start trading again, and says those figures are provisional and subject to revision (its note 5).
- In 2024, by nation: England 282,680 births and 249,730 deaths; Wales 10,105 births and 9,710 deaths; Scotland 18,420 births and 16,140 deaths; Northern Ireland 6,235 births and 4,790 deaths.
- The Office for National Statistics publishes these as accredited official statistics.