Population of the UK 1871-2020

In 2020, the population of the United Kingdom reached 67 million, an increase of around 200 thousand when compared to 2018, when the UK population was 66.8 million. The population has more than doubled since 1871 when just under 31.5 million lived in the UK and has grown by around 8.2 million since the start of the twenty-first century. For most of the twentieth century, the UK population steadily increased, with two noticeable drops in population occurring during World War One (1914-1918) and in World War Two (1939-1945).

Demographic trends in postwar Britain

After World War Two, Britain and many other countries in the Western world experienced a 'baby boom,' with a postwar peak of 1.02 million live births in 1947. Although the number of births fell between 1948 and 1955, they increased again between the mid-50s and mid-60s, with more than one million people born in 1964. Since 1964 however, the UK birth rate has fallen from 18.8 births per 1,000 people to a low of just 10.7 in 2019. As a result, the UK population has gotten significantly older, with the country's median age increasing from 37.9 years in 2001 to 40.4 years in 2019.

What are the most populated areas of the UK?

The vast majority of people in the UK live in England, which had a population of 56.5 million people in 2020, or roughly 84 percent of the UK population. By comparison, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland had populations of 5.46 million, 3.16 million, and 1.89 million, respectively. Within England, South East England had the largest population, at over 9.2 million, followed by the UK's vast capital city of London, at over nine million. London is far larger than any other UK city in terms of urban agglomeration, with just four other cities; Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, and Glasgow, boasting populations that exceed one million people.