ONS Population Estimates for England and Wales: Mid-2024

The main findings are as follows:

• The population of England and Wales continued to grow in the year to mid-2024, reaching an estimated 61.8 million people (61,806,682). The size of the population increased by 706,900 (1.2%) from mid-2023 – 687,600 people (1.2%) for England and 19,300 people (0.6%) for Wales. This is a similar rate of increase to the previous two years. This takes into account recent revisions for mid-2022 and mid-2023 due to improved international and internal migration data.

• Population change is mainly determined by international migration, internal migration, births and deaths.

• Although estimated net international migration (690,100) was lower in the year to mid-2024 compared with the previous year, it continued to contribute most to population growth.

• There was a decrease in the number of births and deaths in the year to mid-2024, compared with the previous year.

• They estimate that there were 596,000 births, a decrease of 2,400 compared with mid-2023 (and the lowest since mid-2002) and that there were 566,000 deaths, a decrease of 32,000 compared with mid-2023 and the lowest since mid-2019 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

• Natural change, the difference between births and deaths, contributed an increase of 30,000.

• The highest rates of population growth were City of London (11.1%), Oadby and Wigston (3.1%), and Preston (2.9%). The greatest rates of population decrease were Isles of Scilly (-2.8%), Kensington and Chelsea (-1.4%) and Lambeth (-0.6%)

Access the full report here.