Workplace pension participation, Great Britain
Official statistics
The share of eligible employees in Great Britain saving into a workplace pension each year since 2009, in all and in the private and public sectors, with the numbers saving, from DWP's workplace pension participation statistics, which it draws from the ONS's Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings.
Eligible employees saving into a workplace pension
90.0%
2025 · 22,610,000 employees, rounded to the nearest thousand
Verified against source, 8 November 2026, 13:43 UTC- All eligible employees
- Private sector
- Public sector
Source: Department for Work and Pensions. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Data table
17 periods, newest first
| Period | All eligible employees | Private sector | Public sector |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 90.0% | 88.0% | 93.0% |
| 2024 | 89.0% | 89.0% | 92.0% |
| 2023 | 88.0% | 86.0% | 93.0% |
| 2022 | 88.0% | 86.0% | 92.0% |
| 2021 | 88.0% | 86.0% | 93.0% |
| 2020 | 88.0% | 86.0% | 93.0% |
| 2019 | 88.0% | 86.0% | 92.0% |
| 2018 | 87.0% | 85.0% | 93.0% |
| 2017 | 84.0% | 81.0% | 92.0% |
| 2016 | 77.0% | 72.0% | 91.0% |
| 2015 | 75.0% | 70.00% | 91.0% |
| 2014 | 71.0% | 63.0% | 92.0% |
| 2013 | 59.0% | 47.0% | 90.0% |
| 2012 | 55.0% | 42.0% | 88.0% |
| 2011 | 56.0% | 42.0% | 88.0% |
| 2010 | 58.0% | 44.0% | 89.0% |
| 2009 | 58.0% | 46.0% | 89.0% |
Source and licence
- Publisher
- Department for Work and Pensions
- Check it yourself
- https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/workplace-pension-participation-and-savings-trends
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0 – Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Retrieved
- 8 November 2026, 13:23 UTC
- Raw files fetched
- https://www.gov.uk/api/content/government/statistics/workplace-pension-participation-and-savings-trends-2009-to-2025SHA-256 51133ab32b9f0f86c0d0d8f8bc676370d3bd3b7a66addeed1b06cec06966ba0f · 16,114 bytes
- https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6a68b23acc35a9471da4c1cf/workplace-pension-participation-2009-2025.xlsxSHA-256 6b6c4ed8d58e782fcc3abcbd7e76ffce8bf3ee048e344e6facadc93119d06f21 · 284,057 bytes
Verification
Verified against source, 8 November 2026, 13:43 UTC Run at 8 November 2026, 13:43 UTC; 51 of 51 figures matched the live source.
| Result | Check | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Pass | Provenance recorded | Department for Work and Pensions; Open Government Licence v3.0; retrieved 2026-11-08T13:23:11Z; 2 raw file(s) |
| Pass | Raw files match recorded SHA-256 | 2 of 2 files intact |
| Pass | Re-parsing raw files reproduces figures | 51 of 51 figures and the headline reproduced; the meta's participating match |
| Pass | Figures are finite numbers | 51 figures, 0 invalid |
| Pass | Live source matches every figure | 51 of 51 figures match exactly after downloading 2 source file(s) again (2 byte-identical); the headline matches; the meta's participating match |
| Pass | GOV.UK table is current | the survey of April 2025 is 557 days before retrieval (limit 600), from Tables: Workplace pension participation and savings trends: 2009 to 2025 (XLS) |
| Pass | Table 1.5's men and women agree | 51 of 51 cases of the sectors' years of eligible employees saving are Table 1.5's men and women together within 1,500 (41 exactly) |
| Pass | The sectors add up | 17 of 17 cases of the years' private and public sector employees saving are all eligible employees saving within 1,500 (12 exactly) |
| Pass | Source page answers | https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/workplace-pension-participation-and-savings-trends – HTTP 200 |
Notes
- Eligible employees are those who meet automatic enrolment's age and earnings criteria. The shares are of eligible employees with a workplace pension, as DWP estimates them from the ONS's Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, a 1% sample of jobs on PAYE, each April.
- DWP gives the numbers saving (meta, participating) rounded to the nearest thousand, for indicative purposes only: it says they should not be read as an accurate count of jobs. Its shares are given to the nearest percentage point.
- The ONS changed how it processes the survey from 2023 and cautions against comparing 2023 to 2025 with earlier years.