Guidance

Coronavirus (COVID-19): testing data methodology

Information on the data sources and methodology used to provide the daily statistics on coronavirus testing.

This publication was withdrawn on

For information, refer to the COVID dashboard.

Documents

Details

The Department of Health and Social Care publishes daily statistics on coronavirus testing.

These statistics cover:

  • testing for coronavirus (COVID-19) – tests and positive cases
  • capacity to process tests – which is published weekly

This document sets out information on the data sources and methodology used to generate each of these measures.

Published 2 June 2020
Last updated 21 August 2020 + show all updates
  1. Updated to reflect that the page 'Coronavirus cases in the UK: daily updated statistics' is no longer updated with daily statistics.

  2. Changes have been made to reflect a historic adjustment of 1,308,071 tests being removed from the 'tests made available' metric.

  3. Updated to include the latest methodology on how positive cases are counted in Wales and Northern Ireland.

  4. Updates have been made throughout the methodology note, including adding new sections to 'methodology' and 'positive cases'.

  5. First published.