Poverty in the UK: statistics

How is poverty measured?

The focus in this briefing is on poverty defined in terms of disposable household income (income after adding benefits and deducting direct taxes). However, poverty may be defined in different ways and there is no single, universally accepted definition.

Two commonly used measures of poverty based on disposable income are:

• Relative low income: This refers to people living in households with income below 60% of the median in that year.
• Absolute low income: This refers to people living in households with income below 60% of median income in a base year. This measurement is adjusted for inflation. In previous releases, the absolute poverty reference year was for 2010/11, but the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) updated it to 2024/25 in the most recent release.

Median income is the point at which half of households have lower income and half have higher income. Income can be measured before or after housing costs are deducted.

How many people are in poverty?

Department for Work and Pensions data shows that around 16% people in the UK were in relative low income (relative poverty) before housing costs in 2024/25. This rises to 20% once housing costs are accounted for.

Note: Data from 2021/22 onward has been linked to DWP administrative data, so figures before and after 2021/22 are not comparable. Section 1.5 provides more detail.

Relative and absolute low income figures for 2024/25 are identical because both use 60% of median income in 2024/25 as a poverty line.

16% of people in the UK were in absolute low income before housing costs in 2024/25, and 20% were in absolute low income (absolute poverty) after housing costs.

Notes: Data from 2021/22 onward has been linked to DWP administrative data, so figures before and after 2021/22 are not comparable. Section 1.5 provides more detail.

The absolute low income base year is 2010/11 before 2021/22 and 2024/25 from 2021/22 onward, so figures before and after 2021/22 are not comparable. Section 1.3 provides more detail.

Over the longer-term, poverty rates have reduced since the late 1990s for children, pensioners, and working-age parents. However, for working-age adults without dependent children the likelihood of being in relative low income has increased.

The government’s child poverty strategy

The government published its child poverty strategy on 5 December 2025.

The strategy lists existing or recently announced policies which will affect household incomes, the cost of essentials and local support for households with children. These include the removal of the two-child limit, the expansion of free school meals in England to all children in households receiving Universal Credit, and local support for children.

The government expects the policies included in the strategy to reduce relative child poverty after housing costs by around 550,000 by the end of the parliament (2028/29).

Some groups are more likely to be in poverty

The following groups had the highest rates of relative poverty after housing costs in 2024/25:

• Working-age adults (43%) and children (58%) living in a family where nobody was in work,
• People in social rented (36%) and private rented (34%) accommodation,
• Children in families with three or more children (45%),
• People in families where someone is disabled (21%),
• People in Bangladeshi (48%) and Pakistani (42%) households.

Other ways of thinking about poverty

Income-based measures are not the only way to measure poverty. The Social Metrics Commission (SMC) proposed basing the measure on the extent that someone’s resources meet their needs. This accounts for differences among households such as costs of childcare and disability, savings, and access to assets. The DWP have developed a new measure called Below Average Resources (BAR), using the framework suggested by the SMC.

A research project funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, a poverty charity, estimates a Minimum Income Standard: the level of income needed to meet a minimum acceptable standard of living each year.

Measures like material deprivation and destitution provide an insight into how many people are unable to afford essentials.