Accredited official statistics

Heavy goods vehicle driver vacancies in the United Kingdom: 2024

Updated 9 July 2025

About this release

These are official statistics. For more information, see the ‘about these statistics’ section.

These statistics include data about heavy goods vehicle (HGV) driver vacancies from quarter 4 (October to December) 2021 to quarter 4 2024.

HGV businesses are asked about driver vacancies, the impact of vacancies on deliveries, financial incentives and wage increases for their HGV drivers.

This is collected as part of the domestic road freight haulage survey. These statistics are for the same period as the domestic road freight statistics.

Accompanying data tables are available.

An annual release on domestic road freight activity and an overview of the road freight sector are also available for 2024.

Definitions

HGV: a vehicle with a gross vehicle weight of more than 3.5 tonnes. The gross vehicle weight is the weight of the vehicle plus the maximum possible weight of goods that can be carried.

Quarter: a calendar year quarter. In this publication, quarter 1 refers to January to March, quarter 2 refers to April to June, quarter 3 refers to July to September, and quarter 4 refers to October to December.

Headline figures

The proportion of HGV businesses reporting HGV driver vacancies has decreased to 24% in quarter 4 2024, from 28% in quarter 3 2024. This is the first fall in reported HGV driver vacancies following increases since quarter 4 2023.

The top three most common reason for vacancies remained the same in 2024 as in 2023. These were ‘better pay or benefit elsewhere’, ‘existing driver leaving industry’ and ‘driver retirement’, each reported by about a third of businesses.

The proportion of HGV businesses with driver vacancies reporting missing deliveries due to drivers not being available was 20% in quarter 4 2024. This is the highest proportion in 2024, up from 11% earlier in the year in quarter 1 2024. This remains lower than the peak of 30% seen in quarter 4 2021.

The proportion of HGV businesses reporting increasing wages of their HGV drivers in the preceding three months was between 11% to 23% in 2024, comparable to proportions seen in 2023.

For businesses reporting increasing wages, the median increase has remained around £1 per hour since quarter 1 2023, although the amount does vary by businesses.

HGV businesses reporting paying financial incentives to recruit or retain drivers has remained below 5% since quarter 3 2023.

HGV driver vacancies

HGV businesses were asked whether they had any driver vacancies at the time of the survey. The businesses with vacancies were then asked about the reasons which contributed to having vacancies. 

Chart 1: HGV businesses on whether they had HGV driver vacancies, %, between quarter 4 2021 and quarter 4 2024 Table RFS0301

Chart 1 is a line chart which shows the proportion of HGV businesses reporting HGV driver vacancies has decreased to 24% (497 out of 2,067 businesses) in quarter 4 2024, from 28% (619 out of 2,226 businesses) in quarter 3 2024.

The proportion of HGV businesses reporting HGV driver vacancies had been increasing since quarter 4 2023. This is the first fall in reported HGV driver vacancies following those increases.

Vacancies remain lower than the 43% (888 out of 2,077 businesses) seen in quarter 4 2021 which data suggests was the peak of the HGV driver shortage.

Chart 2: Most common reasons for HGV driver vacancies reported by HGV businesses, %, between quarter 4 2021 and quarter 4 2024 Table RFS0302

Chart 2 is a line chart which shows that in 2024, the top 3 most common reasons reported for having vacancies remained the same as the previous year. These were ‘better pay or benefits elsewhere’, ‘existing drivers leaving industry’, and ‘driver retirements, reported by about a third of businesses.

In quarter 4 2024:

• ‘better pay or benefits elsewhere’ was reported by 37% of businesses

• ‘existing drivers leaving industry’ was reported by 36% of businesses

• ‘driver retirements’ was reported by 34% of businesses

Note

Respondents could select more than one reason for having HGV driver vacancies.

Table 1: All reasons for driver vacancies reported by HGV businesses with HGV driver vacancies, %, in quarter 4 2024 Table RFS0302

Reasons	Percentage of businesses
Better pay or benefits elsewhere	37%
Existing drivers leaving industry	36%
Driver retirement	34%
Require more drivers to take on new work	26%
Working hours or conditions	19%
New drivers not entering profession	19%
Other	9%
Lack of European drivers	7%
Off-payroll (IR35) rule change	5%
Unavailable HGV driving tests	1%
COVID-19 related	1%

Table 1 shows the 11 reasons for having vacancies, reported by the 497 businesses with HGV driver vacancies in quarter 4 2024.

The fourth most common reason in quarter 4 2024 was ‘Require more drivers to take on new work’, reported by 26% (127 out of 497) of businesses. This has been the fourth most common reason since quarter 1 2023.

Only 1% (4 out of 497) of businesses reported ‘unavailable HGV driving tests’ in quarter 4 2024, which is consistent with other quarters in 2024. This is slightly lower than the 2% of businesses reporting this reason throughout 2023. At the start of the series in quarter 4 2021, 15% reported (131 out of 888 businesses with vacancies).

Missed deliveries due to drivers not being available

HGV businesses with vacancies were asked whether they had missed deliveries in the last week due to drivers not being available.

Chart 3: HGV businesses with vacancies on whether they missed deliveries in the last week due to drivers not being available, %, between quarter 4 2021 and quarter 4 2024 Table RFS0303

Chart 3 is a line chart which shows the proportion of HGV businesses with HGV vacancies reporting missing a delivery due to drivers not being available has been 20% or below since quarter 4 2022.

It was lowest in quarter 1 2024, reported by 11% of businesses (49 out of 430 businesses) but this increased throughout the year to 20% (100 out of 497) in quarter 4 2024.

The percentage of HGV businesses that managed to avoid missing deliveries by changing suppliers or by finding alternative solutions has remained relatively similar over time, at around 20% or below.

Hourly wage increases for HGV drivers

HGV businesses were asked whether they had increased the wages of their drivers within the last three months, regardless of having vacancies.

They were then asked for the reasons which contributed to increasing wages and the amount of the increase.

In 2024, provisional statistics shows that the median hourly pay for HGV drivers was £15.78. This is 8% lower than the median hourly pay for all employees (£17.09).

Source: Annual Survey of hours and Earnings (ASHE), Office for National Statistics (ONS)

Chart 4: HGV businesses on whether they increased the wages of their HGV drivers in the last three months, %, between quarter 4 2021 and quarter 4 2024 Table RFS0304

Chart 4 is a line chart which shows that in 2024, the proportion of HGV businesses reporting increasing wages of their HGV drivers in the preceding three months was between 11% to 23%. This is comparable to proportions seen in 2023.

The highest proportion was in quarter 2 2024, with 23% (484 out of 2,101) of businesses reporting increasing wages. In 2023, the highest proportion was also reported in quarter 2. This may be related to the financial year changing between quarter 1 and quarter 2.

At the start of the series in quarter 4 2021, nearly half of HGV businesses (46%, 964 out of 2,077 businesses) had increased their drivers’ wages in the preceding three months. This fell most steeply in 2022, with by the end of 2022, 16% (382 out of 2,355) of businesses reporting having increasing wages in the preceding three months.

Note

Respondents could select more than one reason for increasing the wages of their HGV driver.

The most common reason reported for increasing wages in quarter 4 2024 was:

• ‘to retain existing drivers’, reported by 56% of businesses 

• ‘planned pay rises’ reported by 46% of businesses 

• ‘to attract new drivers’ reported by 28% of businesses (Table RFS0306)

It is the first time since quarter 1 2023 that ‘to retain existing drivers’ is the most common reason reported, with ‘planned pay rises’ being the most common reasons in previous quarters.

Note

This does not include non-wage based financial incentives such as one-off bonuses (see section on financial incentives paid to HGV drivers).

Chart 5: Amount of hourly wage increases reported by HGV businesses, %, between quarter 4 2021 and quarter 4 2024 Table RFS0305

Chart 5 is a box plot chart which shows that, for HGV businesses which have increased the wages of their HGV drivers, the median amount of hourly wage increase has remained around £1 since quarter 1 2023.

The amount does vary between businesses. For example, in quarter 4 2024, the minimum was £0.02 per hour, the median was £1.00 per hour and the maximum was £3.31 per hour.

Note

Outliers are removed (see the section on Data source for methodology)

Box plot charts show how the data is distributed. Each box represents a range of values associated with wage increases. The line running through each box represents the median value. The top and bottom lines of each box represent the 25th and 75th quartiles respectively, so 50% of the values lie between these two lines. The ‘whiskers’ extending above and below each box represents the minimum and maximum wage increases.

Financial incentives paid to HGV drivers

HGV businesses were asked whether they had paid a non-wage-based financial incentive to recruit or to retain drivers in the last three months, such as a recruitment payment or long-service bonus.

HGV businesses were then also asked about the amount of the incentive paid. 

Chart 6: HGV businesses on whether they have paid a financial incentive in the last three months, %, between quarter 4 2021 and quarter 4 2024 Table RFS0307

Chart 6 is a line chart which shows that the proportion of HGV businesses paying a financial incentive to their HGV drivers has remained below 5% since quarter 3 2023. At the start of the series, quarter 4 2021, 14% (293 out of 2,077) of HGV businesses reporting paying a financial incentive.

In quarter 4 2024, 4% (79 out of 2,067 businesses) of businesses paid an incentive and 2% (35 out of 2,067) were planning to pay one.

Across 2024, the median financial incentive paid to HGV drivers has fluctuated from £250 to £500. The amount paid did vary substantially between HGV businesses. For example, in quarter 4 2024, the minimum amount was £1, the median was £250, and the maximum was £17,500 Table RFS0308.

Note

The number of responses on the amount of financial incentive paid is lower, with about 20 to 140 responses per quarter, so please treat these figures with caution.

Outliers are not removed as no reference period was given. For example, a maximum incentive payment amount of £4,000 paid during quarter 4 2021 may be actually have been paid as an annual bonus rather than for the quarter.

Further sources of information

Other statistics related to HGV drivers and freight are available, including an annual release on domestic road freight activity and an overview of road freight sector in 2024.

ONS number of large goods vehicle drivers (SOC2020 8211)

ONS number of large goods vehicles drivers by nationality and by age group

ONS earnings and hours worked of large goods vehicle drivers

ONS Transport and Storage vacancies

International road freight statistics

Road goods vehicles travelling to Europe

About these statistics

These statistics are official statistics. They comply with the standards of trustworthiness, quality, and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics. More information about these statistics can be found in the statistical release.

Data source

The HGV driver vacancies figures in this release are also collected as part of the domestic road haulage survey, sent to businesses which operate an HGV. The survey provides information on the activity of UK-registered HGVs operating across the UK only, based on a stratified sample of HGVs.

An additional section with questions on HGV driver vacancies was added in October 2021 in response to the shortage of HGV drivers. The estimates in this release are derived from this section. There are about 2,000 to 2,400 responses per quarter Table RFS0309.

Respondents will vary significantly between businesses. The individual completing the survey could be an HGV driver, a business owner, or an administrative staff. Therefore, as they may not know all the business’ information, we have provided a ‘do not know’ option in the survey questions.

In Section 3, ‘Hourly wage increases for HGV drivers’, outliers were removed. A response was considered an outlier if its value lies 1.5 times above the 75th percentile or 1.5 times below the 25th percentile. 

Accompanying data tables are available which give further detail on the key results presented in this statistical release.

Further information about the methodology of the road freight haulage survey can be found in the road freight domestic and international statistics guidance.

An annual release on domestic road freight activity is also available for 2024 from the road freight haulage survey. It covers the type of goods carried by GB-registered HGVs, as well as their origin and destination, method of transportation, intermodal activity, and empty running.

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