UK Company Insolvency Statistics 2026: 22 Key Numbers

UK company insolvency statistics are published every month by the Insolvency Service, advertised case by case in The Gazette and underpinned by filings at Companies House. Pulled together, they show an economy where corporate failure has reset to a structurally higher level. Here are the 22 numbers that matter, each one drawn from an official or authoritative source.

The headline numbers

2023 was the worst year since 1993

In 2023 there were 25,158 registered company insolvencies in England and Wales, seasonally adjusted, the highest annual total since 1993 and 14 percent up on 2022. A decade of cheap money and pandemic support had held failures artificially low; the correction arrived all at once.¹

A three-decade high, in context

This was no statistical quirk. When the 2023 total landed, analysts described UK insolvencies reaching their highest level in 30 years amid a "perfect storm" of high interest rates, weak demand and cost inflation. The years since have kept the count near that mark.²

2024 eased only slightly

2024 brought 23,872 company insolvencies, a fall of about 5 percent on 2023 but still 8 percent above 2022 and well clear of every pre-pandemic year. The insolvency trade body R3 called it a small step down from a record, not a return to normal.³

2025 held the line

2025 recorded 23,938 company insolvencies, essentially flat on 2024 and again about 5 percent below 2023. Two years after the peak, the level has not fallen away: the wave did not break, it plateaued.⁴

The year often opens badly

The calendar matters. Company insolvencies in January 2025 reached 1,971, the highest January reading in more than five years and 11 percent up year on year, as businesses that limped through Christmas ran out of road. Early-year spikes have become a recurring feature of the data.⁵

The latest month keeps climbing

The most recent figures point up, not down. In April 2026 there were 2,085 registered company insolvencies, 3 percent higher than April 2025, and the 12-month liquidation rate stood at 1 in 193 active companies (51.8 per 10,000). No sign yet of the sustained fall that would signal recovery.⁶

The rate in context

Measured against 5.4 million companies

That rate is calculated against a very large base. The UK register held 5.43 million companies at 31 March 2025, with an effective register of about 4.87 million once companies in dissolution or liquidation are stripped out. A record count of failures still touches a small share of all companies.⁷

Almost all failures are small firms

The failures are overwhelmingly small businesses. Small and medium-sized enterprises make up around 99.9 percent of the UK's private-sector businesses, and it is these firms, not household-name corporates, that account for the vast bulk of insolvencies each year.⁸

Still below the long-run average

For all the alarm, the rate sits below its historic norm. The Bank of England notes insolvencies running at around 50 per 10,000 firms, well under the long-term average of roughly 100 per 10,000, and judges the current level unlikely to threaten lender resilience. Painful for those affected, but not yet a systemic event.⁹

How companies fail: the procedure split

CVL is the default ending

Creditors' voluntary liquidation dominates. In 2023 there were 20,577 CVLs, a record high in a series going back to 1960, and in 2024 CVLs made up 79 percent of all company insolvencies. Most UK failures are not courtroom dramas, they are directors winding up a company that can no longer pay its way.¹⁰

67,369 companies in critical distress

Behind the completed insolvencies sits a much larger pipeline. Begbies Traynor's Red Flag Alert recorded 67,369 companies in "critical" financial distress in the fourth quarter of 2025, a 21.3 percent jump on the previous quarter. Critical distress is a strong predictor of failure within a year.¹¹

Compulsory liquidation is back

The court-ordered route is climbing. Compulsory liquidations reached their highest annual number since 2012 in 2025, as creditors, including HMRC, returned to enforcement after years of restraint. More failures are now being forced through the courts rather than chosen by directors.¹²

Distress up 78 percent year on year

The trend accelerated through 2025. In the third quarter, critical financial distress rose 78 percent year on year, from 31,201 to 55,530 companies, with every one of the 22 monitored sectors deteriorating. That pipeline feeds directly into the insolvency figures that follow.¹³

Administration and rescue stay rare

Administrations ran at about 1,597 in 2024, and CVAs numbered just 202, together well under a tenth of all cases, with receivership appointments countable on one hand each year. The rescue-and-restructure procedures that fill the business press are statistically marginal next to liquidation.¹⁴

The wider strain

Personal insolvencies are rising too

The pressure is not confined to companies. There were 117,947 personal insolvencies in 2024, up 14 percent on 2023, even as corporate numbers eased. Company directors and consumers are feeling the same cost squeeze from opposite ends.¹⁵

280,000 businesses closed their doors

Insolvency is only the formal tip of business exit. The ONS counted around 280,000 UK business closures in 2024 against 317,000 openings; most closures never become an insolvency case, but they map the same difficult trading environment.¹⁶

Which industries fail most

Construction leads every year

Construction is consistently the hardest-hit sector, at around 17 percent of all cases where an industry was captured across 2024, ahead of every other part of the economy. Thin margins, fixed-price contracts and long payment chains leave builders exposed the moment demand softens.¹⁷

Retail and hospitality follow

Wholesale and retail and accommodation and food services came next, at roughly 15 percent of cases each, and the distress data shows the pressure still building in consumer-facing trades. These are the front line of the squeeze on household spending.¹⁸

Beyond England and Wales

Scotland has stayed broadly flat

The devolved nations publish separately. In Scotland there were 1,236 corporate insolvencies in 2024, almost unchanged from 1,234 in 2023, a steadier picture than the volatility further south but still historically elevated.¹⁹

Northern Ireland jumped sharply

Northern Ireland moved the other way. Its 305 company insolvencies in 2024 were 40 percent up on 2023, the fastest proportional rise in the UK, showing the pressure is nationwide even where the base numbers are small.²⁰

Where the data comes from

Built from the official record

Every figure here is public. The Insolvency Service publishes the monthly and annual statistics, The Gazette is the official journal where each appointment is advertised, and Companies House holds the underlying filings under the Open Government Licence. Together they make UK company insolvency one of the most transparent datasets in the economy.²¹

Our read: watch the cases, not the quarter

A single bad year can be dismissed as a spike; three years near a 30-year high cannot. InsolvencyRadar records every UK company insolvency the day it is filed, so you can track the latest cases by industry and region weeks before they reach a quarterly release. If the base rate of failure has reset higher, monitoring it case by case is exactly what the InsolvencyRadar service is built for.²²