Background information and methodology
Updated 10 July 2025
Applies to England, Scotland and Wales
© Crown copyright 2025
This publication is licensed under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.0 except where otherwise stated. To view this licence, visit nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3 or write to the Information Policy Team, The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: psi@nationalarchives.gov.uk.
Where we have identified any third party copyright information you will need to obtain permission from the copyright holders concerned.
This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/universal-credit-claimants-statistics-on-the-two-child-limit-policy-april-2025/background-information-and-methodology
This is background information and methodology for the Universal Credit claimants statistics on the two child limit policy.
Context of the statistics
What is Universal Credit?
Universal Credit (UC) supports people both in and out of work. It replaces 6 legacy benefits:
- Child Tax Credit
- Housing Benefit
- Income Support
- income-related Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)
- income-related Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)
- Working Tax Credit
Read further information about Universal Credit, including making a claim.
What is the two child limit policy?
Since 6 April 2017, families can claim support for up to two children. There may be further entitlement for third or subsequent children if they were born before 6 April 2017 or if an exception applies.
In earlier publications this policy has been referred to as “the policy to provide support for a maximum of two children”.
What are the exceptions to the policy?
There are exceptions for third and subsequent children who are:
- additional children in a multiple birth where an extra amount will be payable for all children in a multiple birth other than the first child
- likely to have been born as a result of non-consensual conception, which for this purpose includes rape or where the claimant was in a controlling or coercive relationship with the child’s other biological parent at the time of conception
An exception also applies for any children in a household who are:
- adopted when they would otherwise be in local authority care
- in non-parental caring arrangements when they would otherwise be at risk of entering the care system, including where a child (under 16) has a child
On 28 November 2018 exceptions for non-parental care and adoption arrangements were extended to apply to any eligible children in a household.
Read further information on the policy and the exceptions in Universal Credit.
Purpose of the statistics
Who might be interested?
The statistics contained in this publication will be of interest for anyone that is looking for information on the impact of the policy to provide support for a maximum of two children, and the exceptions.
What does this publication tell me?
This publication shows the number of households (single or couple households with any dependent children or young people) affected by the two child limit policy. Households are counted on Universal Credit if they have an open UC claim within the month of April 2025.
Households are considered to be affected by the policy if they have a third or subsequent child to their household born on or after 6 April 2017, including those for whom an exception applies.
Purpose of the statistics
The statistics in this publication relate to the policy which has been in operation since 6 April 2017. In future years, more households with two or more children claiming UC will have a child who has been born on or after 6 April 2017, and so the numbers affected will increase over time.
The publication does not contain information relating to those who have applied for an exception but have not met the criteria to qualify. Once claimants have submitted supporting documents which meet the eligibility criteria for an exception, the exception will be granted and there are no circumstances in which an exception would not be granted where the correct supporting documents have been provided.
Limitations of the statistics
The region and local authority information is derived from the claimant residential address, and this is not present for all households in the UC data source. Therefore, there is a small number of households with unknown region and local authority information.
For the small number of Universal Credit cases where the postcode information was not available the country of the Job Centre the claimants was allocated to has been used. Further information on the National Statistics Postcode Look-up can be found on the Office for National Statistics (ONS) website.
This release includes additional information on ethnicity and gender. This is being released as statistics in development. We welcome feedback from users on this and other developments.
Statistics on ethnicity and ethnic group are based on the responses of claimants from Universal Credit Equality questions. It is not mandatory for claimants to answer these questions, and so data is not held for those claimants that have not responded. The volumes of households where at least one claimant did not respond or responded “prefer not to say” have been included in these statistics as “unspecified” for the particular question they did not answer.
Rounding
The figures have been rounded to the nearest 10, or nearest 1%. Low numbers including zero are suppressed in accordance with disclosure rules. This can lead to components as shown not summing to totals. Low numbers including zero are suppressed in accordance with disclosure rules, as is demographic information where the response rate did not meet the threshold for publication. This can lead to components as shown not summing to totals.
Comparisons between the statistics
The publication includes figures on the number of households with dependent children or eligible young people, whereas data available on Stat-Xplore includes all children or young people declared in a household on UC who are under 20 and whose details are verified by DWP. Therefore, there will be differences when looking at the number of households with 3 or more children between this publication and data available through Stat-Xplore.
On Stat-Xplore, the total number of children may not be equal to the number of dependent children in the household who are eligible for child element for various reasons, including children over the age of 16 in non-advanced full-time education, looked-after children and, other young people living in multigenerational households whose parents are not the claimant.
Source of the statistics
The data for Universal Credit is fully sourced from administrative data covering UC Full Service only and contains households with an open Universal Credit claim within the month of April 2025. UC Live Service are therefore excluded for figures produced prior to April 2019.
Definitions and terminology within the statistics
The analysis covers all UC claims that have declared a third or subsequent child as being born on or after 6 April 2017. The number of eligible children declared was compared to the number of children paid for as part of their April payment. If there is a difference, they have been impacted by the policy and if there is no difference then they have received an exception.
A UC claim’s in-work status is determined by having positive take home earnings included in their April statement.
Postcode information for claimants were combined with geographical details obtained from the Office for National Statistics’ National Statistics Postcode Look-up (NSPL). England, Scotland and Wales data represent geographical boundaries derived from Census 2021 data and has been taken from the NSPL.
Revisions to the statistics
This year’s release includes many new breakdowns for Universal Credit households. Where possible, we have also calculated these values annually from April 2018. As most of the figures are new, we have also recalculated the previously published Universal Credit data from previous years.
Any CTC data in the publication has been released in previous releases of the statistics.
Status of the statistics
Official Statistics
These are Official Statistics. There is ongoing development of the data systems used to support Universal Credit and as such, the methodologies used to produce these statistics are constantly monitored and is subject to revision as improved data sources become available.
Child Tax Credit
Previous releases of these statistics included data on Child Tax Credits, which ended in April 2025.
Quality Statement
Validation and quality assurance processes
Universal Credit statistics have been continually monitored over the past year and comparison of previous month snapshots have shown a consistent proportion of claims have been affected by the policy. Internal departmental quality assurance checks have been carried out to reassure the reliability of the statistics. Figures have also been compared to the number of claims with children declared to contextualise the percentage of UC claims which have been affected.
Feedback
We welcome feedback.
We are committed to improving the official statistics we publish. We want to encourage and promote user engagement, so we can improve our statistical outputs. We would welcome any views you have using the contact information below:
DWP Press Office
For media enquiries, please contact the DWP press office.
Statistical contacts
S Lewis, G Walmsley: ucad.briefinganalysis@dwp.gov.uk
Useful links
Collection page for all releases of these statistics
This release
Universal Credit claimants statistics, 2025
Previous releases
Universal Credit and Child Tax Credit claimants statistics, 2024
Universal Credit and Child Tax Credit claimants statistics, 2023
Universal Credit and Child Tax Credit claimants statistics, 2022
Universal Credit and Child Tax Credit claimants statistics, 2021
Child Tax Credit and Universal Credit claimants statistics, 2020
Child Tax Credit and Universal Credit claimants statistics, 2019
Child Tax Credit and Universal Credit claimants statistics, 2018
Supporting guides
Read further information about Universal Credit, including making a claim.