Official Statistics

Adult social care client level data, England: quarterly update to September 2025

Published 15 January 2026

Applies to England

Introduction

This report contains statistics aggregated from client level data (CLD) to provide information about adult social care long-term support and assessments in local authorities in England for October 2024 to September 2025.

These statistics are published quarterly as official statistics in development.

Updates to current report

Quarterly CLD statistics were previously published in the Monthly statistics for adult social care collection. They will now be published on a quarterly basis in January, April, July and October as part of the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update collection.

Official statistics on topics including occupancy and flu vaccination in adult social care settings and the number of people receiving adult social care services can be found on the Adult social care provider statistics, England: quarterly update page. After the initial January 2026 publication, the provider statistics will be updated in March, June, September and December.

This separation of publications is owing to differences in data collection and coverage between CLD and Capacity Tracker derived metrics. CLD covers people receiving local authority-provided or organised long-term support, or undergoing local authority assessments, and is collected at an individual level. Capacity Tracker data covers all CQC-registered adult social care providers and the people they care for and is collected at a provider level. As such, both publications offer different insights into the adult social care sector and should be considered separately.

The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) publishes a range of official statistics on adult social care. We are committed to improving the service for the wide range of users who want and need easy access to our statistics. Feedback from users is essential to this, and we want to gather insights on who uses these statistics, user experiences, and any challenges currently faced when making use of the adult social care client level data publication. If you are a user of these statistics, contact us at asc.statistics@dhsc.gov.uk.

Updates on future reports

The next publication will be released on 2 April 2026. Dates for future publications will be announced on the GOV.UK publication release calendar.

Main points

The main points outlined in this bulletin are that:

• on 30 September 2025, there were 683,000 people receiving long-term local authority arranged or provided adult social care in England
• from October 2024 to September 2025, 609,000 people received a local authority adult social care assessment in England, having not received local authority long-term support in the previous 12 months

The statistics in this report are taken from the accompanying data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

The chapters below contain detailed analysis on the published statistics. Throughout this report counts given are rounded to the nearest 1,000, except numbers below 10,000 which are rounded to the nearest 10. Rates per 100,000 population are rounded to the nearest 10.

1. Long-term support

On 30 September 2025, there were 683,000 people receiving long-term local authority arranged or provided adult social care. As a population rate, this represents 1,470 people per 100,000 adults in England. Of these:

• 490,000 people were receiving support in the community, representing 1,060 per 100,000 adults in England
• 138,000 people were receiving support in residential care homes, representing 300 per 100,000 adults
• 55,000 people were receiving support in nursing homes, representing 120 per 100,000 adults
• 260 people were receiving support in prison

Note that people may be receiving long-term support in multiple settings but are counted in only one category per month for these statistics.

Figure 1: number of people receiving local authority arranged or provided long-term adult social care support at the end of the month, England, by support setting from 31 October 2024 to 30 September 2025

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 1 of the accompanying long-term support data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

The total number of people receiving long-term support in England showed an increase from 667,000 on 31 October 2024 to 683,000 on 30 September 2025.

This trend is driven by the increase in long-term support delivered in community settings, which covers home care and support in the form of direct payments from the local authority that people can then use to buy their own care and support. The number of people receiving long-term support in the community increased from 474,000 on 31 October 2024 to 490,000 on 30 September 2025. The reported increase could be partly due to improved reporting by some local authorities.

Ethnicity of people receiving long-term support

In terms of the ethnic background of people receiving long-term support, White people of English, Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish or British background were the largest ethnic group in receipt of long-term support. As of 30 September 2025, 525,000 people identifying as this ethnicity were receiving long-term support, representing 1,560 per 100,000 people of this ethnicity in England.

The rates showing numbers per 100,000 population in England use the broadest Office for National Statistics ethnicity classifications.

There were 41,000 people receiving long-term support on 30 September 2025 who categorised themselves as Asian or Asian British. This represents 1,040 per 100,000 people of this ethnic group.

On 30 September 2025, there were 36,000 people receiving long-term support who categorised themselves as Black, Black British, Caribbean or African, representing 2,100 per 100,000 people of this ethnic group.

Of those receiving long-term support on 30 September 2025, 32,000 people were recorded with undeclared or unknown ethnicity and 2,400 people were recorded as having refused to declare their ethnicity.

Figure 2: number of people per 100,000 in England receiving local authority arranged or provided long-term adult social care support, by ethnicity, 30 September 2025

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 6 of the accompanying long-term support data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

Gender of people receiving long-term support

CLD is based on administrative data from local authority case management systems (CMSs), which are primarily designed for service delivery. As such, while the data collection is intended to collect gender, and has a gender field defined in the CLD guidance as ‘the gender the individual considers themselves to be’ which gives ‘male’, ‘female’ and ‘other’ options, recording practices for sex and gender can vary across local authorities.

The populations used to calculate proportions of people receiving long-term support by gender are taken from the Office for National Statistics mid-year estimates of the population for England and Wales. These populations are broken down into categories by sex whereas CLD breaks down by gender. Proportions are presented for illustrative purposes only and therefore caution should be applied when interpreting them.

Of those receiving long-term support on 30 September 2025:

• 383,000 people were recorded as female, representing 1,600 per 100,000 female adults in England
• 298,000 people were recorded as male, representing 1,330 per 100,000 male adults in England
• 430 people had gender recorded as ‘other’
• gender data was not submitted for 1,340 people

Figure 3: number of people per 100,000 in England receiving local authority arranged or provided long-term adult social care support, by gender and support setting, 30 September 2025

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 5 of the accompanying long-term support data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

Age group of people receiving long-term support

Of those receiving long-term support on 30 September 2025:

• 403,000 were aged 65 or above, representing 3,670 people per 100,000 adults aged 65 and above in England
• 280,000 were aged 18 to 64, representing 790 per 100,000 adults under 65 in England

Of people aged 85 and above, 11,360 per 100,000 people were receiving long-term support on 30 September 2025. This compares with 3,650 per 100,000 people aged 75 to 84 and 1,620 per 100,000 people aged 65 to 74.

For all age groups there was an increase in the number of people receiving long-term support in the community from 31 October 2024 to 30 September 2025. Figure 4 shows this increase broken down by age group.

Figure 4: number of people receiving local authority arranged or provided long-term adult social care support in the community at the end of the month, England, by age group, from 31 October 2024 to 30 September 2025

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 1 of the accompanying long-term support data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

Regional analysis of long-term support

On 30 September 2025, the 3 English regions with the largest number of people receiving long-term support were:

• North West: 109,000 people
• London: 105,000 people
• South East: 99,000 people

The North East was the region with the largest proportion of people receiving long-term support on 30 September 2025 at 1,830 per 100,000 people living in the North East. Conversely, the smallest proportion was 1,300 per 100,000 people in the South East.

All regions had a small reported increase in the number of people receiving long-term support from 31 October 2024 to 30 September 2025 except the East Midlands and the West Midlands which had small reported decreases.

At local authority level, figures and any apparent trends should be interpreted with caution, since we are aware that some local authorities do not have complete coverage and have known data quality issues that they have improved over time and are working to resolve for future submissions. Further information about data quality can be found in the accompanying client level data background quality and methodology document.

2. Assessments

From October 2024 to September 2025, 609,000 people received a local authority adult social care assessment in England, having not received local authority long-term support in the previous 12 months. As a population rate, this represents 1,310 people per 100,000 adults in England.

In July 2025, there were 56,000 people assessed, the largest monthly number during the period. The month with the lowest reported number of people assessed was December 2024, in which 45,000 people received an assessment. The apparent drop in August 2025 and September 2025 may be due to delays in recording of completed assessments on local case management systems, from which CLD is drawn. The monthly time series will be updated in future publications.

Figure 5: number of people receiving adult social care assessments, who have not received local authority long-term support in the previous 12 months, England, from October 2024 to September 2025

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 1 of the accompanying assessments data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

Ethnicity of people receiving assessments

Between October 2024 and September 2025, 422,000 people receiving adult social care assessments identified as being White and of an English, Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish or British background, representing 1,250 per 100,000 people of this ethnicity in England. This makes this group the majority (82%) of those receiving assessments with a recorded ethnicity.

The rates showing numbers per 100,000 population in England use the broadest Office for National Statistics ethnicity classifications.

In this period, the total number of people assessed in each broad ethnic group is:

• Asian or Asian British: 32,000 representing 800 per 100,000 people of this ethnicity in England
• Black, Black British, Caribbean or African: 19,000 representing 1,140 per 100,000 people of this ethnicity in England
• Mixed or multiple ethnic groups: 6,410 representing 740 per 100,000 people of this ethnicity in England
• White: 444,000 representing 1,190 per 100,000 people of this ethnicity in England
• other ethnic group: 11,000
• no data: 97,000

Figure 6: total number of people per 100,000 in England receiving adult social care assessments between October 2024 and September 2025, who have not received local authority long-term support in the last 12 months, by ethnicity

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 6 of the accompanying assessments data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

Gender of people receiving assessments

CLD is based on administrative data from local authority case management systems (CMSs), which are primarily designed for service delivery. As such, while the data collection is intended to collect gender, and has a gender field defined in the CLD guidance as ‘the gender the individual considers themselves to be’ which gives ‘male’, ‘female’ and ‘other’ options, recording practices for sex and gender can vary across local authorities.

The populations used to calculate proportions of people receiving assessments by gender are taken from the Office for National Statistics mid-year estimates of the population for England and Wales. These populations are broken down into categories by sex whereas CLD breaks down by gender. Proportions are presented for illustrative purposes only and therefore caution should be applied when interpreting them.

The majority of people assessed between October 2024 and September 2025 were recorded as female (58% of those with recorded gender). In this period, 346,000 were assessed, representing 1,440 per 100,000 female adults in England. There were 254,000 people recorded as male that were assessed in the same period, representing 1,130 per 100,000 male adults in England.

Additionally, 510 had gender recorded as ‘other’ and gender data was not submitted for 8,810 people.

Figure 7: total number of people per 100,000 in England receiving adult social care assessments between October 2024 and September 2025, who have not received local authority long-term support in the last 12 months, by gender

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 5 of the accompanying assessments data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

Age group of people receiving assessments

Between October 2024 and September 2025, there were 417,000 people assessed in England who were aged 65 and above, representing 3,800 per 100,000 people aged 65 and above in England. In the same period, 192,000 people were assessed who were aged 18 to 64, representing 540 per 100,000 adults aged under 65 in England. There were also 790 people with unrecorded age assessed.

Within the older age groups, the number of people assessed in this period is:

• 169,000 people aged 75 to 84
• 140,000 people aged 85 to 94
• 17,000 people aged 95 and above

The relatively small number of people being assessed aged 95 and above can likely be explained by a smaller overall population and a higher proportion of people already receiving long-term support by that age.

Figure 8: number of people receiving adult social care assessments, who have not received local authority long-term support in the previous 12 months by age group, England, from October 2024 to September 2025

Source: adult social care client level data collection.

This data can be found in table 1 of the accompanying assessments data tables on the Adult social care client level data, England, quarterly update to September 2025 page.

Regional analysis of assessments

Between October 2024 and September 2025, the 3 regions with the largest number of people that received assessments were:

• North West: 97,000
• South East: 82,000
• West Midlands: 80,000

The region with the largest proportion of people receiving assessments was the North East with 1,700 per 100,000 people. Conversely, the smallest proportion was 1,070 per 100,000 people in the South West. Comparison between localities should be made with caution as there are some differences in local reporting that may lead to invalid conclusions.

At local authority level, figures and any apparent trends should be interpreted with caution, since we are aware that some local authorities do not have complete coverage and have known data quality issues that they have improved over time and are working to resolve for future submissions.

Terminology

Adult social care long-term support

Care provided or arranged by local authorities for individuals whose needs are expected to be ongoing, without a set end point. This includes support delivered in the community, residential care, nursing care and in prisons.

Adult social care assessments

Activity carried out by local authorities to examine individuals’ needs for care and support.

About these statistics

This is a quarterly publication by DHSC of official statistics in development on CLD.

These statistics are being published as a part of a wider portfolio of statistics on adult social care. The Government Statistical Service compiles a UK adult social care database of official statistics on adult social care across the 4 nations of the UK.

These statistics are assessed regularly and any improvements in quality are incorporated accordingly at the next available opportunity. The scope of the data included in this publication is also assessed to ensure the value of these statistics is maintained. Data collection may change in response to shifts in priorities, leading to corresponding adjustments in this bulletin’s reporting.

The UK Statistics Authority conducted a review of adult social care statistics in England, which called for:

• better leadership and collaboration across different organisations publishing official statistics. This publication has been produced in collaboration with other statistics providers of COVID-19 adult social care data and DHSC will endeavour to work with various stakeholders as more data is published through this publication
• addressing of gaps in available data, particularly in privately funded care. This bulletin aims to plug some of that gap by including data on residents privately funding their care in addition to those funded by local authorities
• improving existing official statistics - more data will be added iteratively based on user needs

Methodology, data source and data quality

The long-term support and assessment statistics in this quarterly publication are created using client level data. The client level data collection is the first national collection of social care records, covering requests for support, assessments, reviews and services arranged or provided by local authorities as part of their duties under the Care Act 2014.

More detailed information about data sources, coverage and statistical quality can be found in the client level data background quality and methodology for these statistics.

For coverage and quality of local authority CLD submissions relevant to this quarterly publication, see the ‘Notes’ tab in the accompanying data tables.

Contact

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For feedback and any further questions, contact asc.statistics@dhsc.gov.uk.