Social care statistics 2026

Social care in the UK continues to be in high demand. Home care and care home statistics show that there are increasing numbers of people who need support, and there are still a large number of staff vacancies.

In this article, we’ll concentrate on adult social care statistics in England.

Home care statistics

Demand for social care in England continues to grow

Home care, or domiciliary care, is growing in popularity, with more people choosing to receive support in their own homes. However, recruiting and retaining home care staff is still challenging.

According to the Skills for Care report Domiciliary Care Services in the Adult Social Care sector, in March 2025, the CQC regulated 15,232 domiciliary care organisations – up from 13,733 the previous year.

Average cost of home care services

The average cost of an hour of home care was £23.56 in 2024-25 – an increase of seven per cent on the previous year, according to the Department of Health & Social Care.

Half a million people received CQC-regulated domiciliary care

499,797 clients were supported by paid carers in November 2025, according to the Department of Health & Social Care’s Adult social care in England, monthly statistics: December 2025.

This number has increased by around 20,000 since May.

If you’re a care provider supporting clients in their own homes, you might find that your workload has grown in the last few months. Home care software can help you streamline your processes, letting your team record notes and see care plans quickly – making it easier for your carers to get on with their most important job: providing great care.

Book a tour today to see how PASS can support safer decision making and calmer days for your clients and your team.

The home care workforce

According to the March 2025 Skills for Care report, home care organisations employed around 595,000 people, broken down as follows:

Carers: around 515,000
Registered managers: around 48,000
Regulated professions, such as occupational therapists and registered nurses: around 2,200
Other roles, such as administrative staff, activity workers, and IT support: around 27,000

56 per cent of domiciliary care workers were full time employees, whereas 44 per cent are employed on a part-time basis.

Around 9 per cent of home care workers are bank, pool, or agency staff.

Vacancies in home care

Home care providers had around 59,000 vacant posts this year.

This is a significant decrease from the previous year, down by 11 per cent. However, 74 per cent of domiciliary care organisations reported that it was challenging to recruit new care workers, according to the Adult Social Care Workforce survey in April 2025.

Home care schedules

Around 40 per cent of home care organisations change their carers’ schedules on a weekly basis, according to the Homecare Association.

We know that this lack of predictability can make it harder to recruit and retain good staff in domiciliary care. If you’re a care provider, care planning software like PASS can help you create the best schedules for your care workers and your clients, so that everyone knows what to expect.

Unpaid home care

A lot of home care is provided by friends or family members, who may not consider themselves to be carers.

According to the GP Patient Survey, around 16 per cent of people in England look after someone with long-term physical or mental health conditions or illnesses, or problems related to old age.

Figures for home care in England and Wales will never be completely accurate. Many people provide unpaid, informal care for family members, and never claim any kind of benefits.

Information about these carers is unlikely to be recorded by regulators. Some of these people might not consider themselves to be carers, so they will not report themselves as such on the Census, or respond to questionnaires from carers’ organisations.

Care home statistics

Shift to alternative care services

Care homes are decreasing in popularity, with more people opting for domiciliary care services.

In March 2025, the CQC regulated 4,186 care homes with nursing, and 10,301 care homes without nursing. Both of these showed a decrease from the previous year, according to Skills for Care’s State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce in England report.

Reasons for this decrease may include:

Affordability
Clients preferring the independence of remaining in their own homes
Lack of local or suitable care home beds

Cost of care home services

According to carehome.co.uk, the average weekly cost of residential care without nursing is around £1,298. For clients needing nursing care or specialist dementia support, these costs can rise as high as £1,564 a week.

Costs vary across the country, with prices in the North East being lower than elsewhere, and London and the South East being significantly higher.

Private vs public funding in care homes

Some clients will have part or all of these fees paid by their local authority, NHS Continuing Healthcare or NHS Funded Nursing Care, depending on their circumstances.

However, around half of all care home residents will pay the full amount, according to carehome.co.uk.

Number of people living in care homes

More than 360,000 people live in care homes in England.

This includes approximately 333,592 adults over 65, and around 26,751 residents who are younger. These figures come from the Department of Health & Social Care’s December 2025 monthly statistics on adult social care in England.

Care home occupancy rates

Care home occupancy rates have stayed fairly stable for the last year.

As of November 2025, 86.3 per cent of care home beds were occupied, according to the Department of Health & Social Care. This rate has largely remained stable for the last year.

Care home workforce

There is a growing workforce in care homes across England.

Care homes both with and without nursing have had a higher number of new starters than people who leave, according to the State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce in England report.

The vacancy rate in care homes is between four and five per cent.

The breakdown of staff in care homes with nursing is as follows:

Carers: around 174,000
Registered managers: around 12,000
Regulated professions, such as registered nurses: around 34,000
Other roles, such as administrative staff, activity workers, and IT support: around 71,000

The breakdown of staff in care homes without nursing is:

Carers: around 233,000
Registered managers: around 28,000
Regulated professions, such as registered nurses: around 450
Other roles, such as administrative staff, activity workers, and IT support: around 57,000

Care home recruitment

Care homes with nursing attract more experienced workers.

According to Skills for Care, workers in care homes with nursing have, on average, 9.6 years of experience in the social care sector. Those working in care homes without nursing have an average of 8.2 years’ experience.

Bank and agency care home staff

Bank and agency staff continue to play a large role in care homes.

Bank and agency staff make up nine per cent of the workers in care homes without nursing, and 10 per cent of workers in care homes with nursing. These figures also come from the Skills for Care report.

Are you a care provider who uses agency staff regularly? To help them hit the ground running, consider using care management software like PASS. Find care plans, risk assessments, and other important notes all in one place.

New people in care statistics

Requests for care support services

According to the Care Provider Alliance, in the year leading up to March 2025, there were just over 2 million requests for support from people who had not accessed social care services before.

1.3 million of these were from adults over 65, and the rest were people aged between 18 and 64.

Social care statistics: the workforce

Overseas recruitment

This year, we have seen big changes in the social care workforce, with a significant decrease in workers hired from overseas.

Between 2023-24, around 105,000 workers were hired from overseas to work in social care. In 2024-25, this figure dropped to around 50,000. These figures, from Skills for Care, reflect changes in immigration laws. More recent changes to the Health and Care Worker visa, coming after this report was released, suggest that these figures will drop even further over the next few months.

Demographics

Care is still a female-dominated sector, but there are more male employees than ever before.

In the year 2024-25, one in five care workers was male, according to the State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce in England report, produced by Skills for Care. However, across all roles in social care, 22 per cent of workers identify as male – an increase of around four per cent in three years. Senior managers are the role with the largest percentage of male employees in the sector, with one-third being male.

Vacancy rates

A majority of organisations found it challenging to recruit and retain staff, according to a report by the Department of Health & Social Care in April 2025.

The main barrier to recruitment and retention continues to be the low rate of pay compared to other sectors. More than a third of staff leaving care organisations explain that their main reason is to get better pay outside of the care sector.

However, many people stay in the sector for a long time. Across all job roles, the average worker in adult social care has more than nine years’ experience.

Turnover among younger carers

Younger care workers have the highest turnover.

According to Skills for Care, the turnover rate of workers under 25 was 38 per cent. However, care workers over 50 had a turnover rate of just 20 per cent. Carers are most likely to leave in the first year of their role, if they are on a zero-hours contract, or if their facility has a low CQC score.

Social care statistics: finances

Budget

Spending on both short- and long-term adult social care increased in 2024-25.

According to the Department of Health & Social Care, there was an increase of 10 per cent of spending on long-term care, and seven per cent on short-term care.

Long-term care costs were fairly evenly split among age groups, with 51 per cent being spent on clients 65 and over, and 49 per cent on younger adults. However, local authorities spent substantially more on short-term care for older adults – 76 per cent of all short-term care costs were for those aged 65 and over.

NHS funding

NHS funding pays care providers less than councils do.

According to the Homecare Association’s Homecare Deficit report, the average NHS rate of funding is £0.43 per hour lower than the rate paid by councils. However, clients receiving NHS-funded care often have more complex health needs.

Wage bill

The total wage bill for adult social care in 2024-25 was £31.8 billion – this is an increase of more than 12 per cent compared to the previous year, according to Skills for Care.

This is due to the rise in the National Living Wage over the last 12 months, as well as the increase in the size of the social care workforce.

Sources

Data for this article has come from the following sources. Where possible, we are using the most up-to-date figures from 2025 – however, we are also drawing on some social care statistics from the 2024-25 financial year.