Activity, size and location

UK businesses broken down by location, industry, legal status and employment, and UK enterprise levels measured by turnover.

Spotlight

The number of UK business births has remained broadly similar between 2017 and 2018, moving from 382,000 to 381,000, a birth rate of 12.9% in 2018 compared with 13.1% in 2017.
The number of UK business deaths decreased from 362,000 to 336,000 between 2017 and 2018, a death rate of 11.4% compared with 12.4% in 2017.
London had the highest business birth rate at 15.9%, whereas the North West had the highest death rate at 13.5%.

The number of businesses removed from the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR) (business closures) in the UK in Quarter 2 (Apr to June) 2020 was slightly lower than in Quarter 2 of the past three years.
Business closures do not appear to have yet increased as a result of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic; this is because of the time it takes for a business to close, delays in the reporting process and government support for businesses.
The number of businesses added to the IDBR (business creations) in the UK in Quarter 2 2020 was slightly lower than in Quarter 2 of the past three years.

Catch up on the latest data and analysis related to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and its impact on the economy, business and jobs.

Business demography, quarterly experimental statistics, UK

Experimental quarterly statistics on business creations or births and closures or deaths from the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR) with high-level breakdowns by industry and region.
UK business: activity, size and location

The data contained in these tables are numbers of enterprises and local units produced from a snapshot of the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR) taken on 15 March 2019. The publication contains tables on local units and enterprises by geography, industry, legal status and employment size band. Additional tables at enterprise level provide information by turnover size band.
Business demography, UK

Annual data on births, deaths and survivals of businesses in the UK, by geographical area and Standard Industrial Classification 2007: SIC 2007 groups.

Business demography, UK: 2018

Change in the number of UK businesses broken down by sector of the economy.
UK business; activity, size and location: 2019

UK businesses broken down by legal status, industry, region, employment and turnover size bands.