Prisons

There were around 87,000 people in prison in England and Wales in 2026.

In the chart, you can see how this population has changed since 1990. The prison population has nearly doubled since the early 1990s.

Many prisons in England and Wales are at, or over capacity, and have been for several decades.

The chart shows the total prison population compared to two measures of capacity.

Uncrowded capacity is the number of people that prisons were designed to hold. England and Wales is already over this capacity, and has been for most of the time since 2011, apart from 2020 to 2022, when the prison population fell during the pandemic.

Useable operational capacity is the maximum that prisons can safely hold; using this capacity forces cells to be shared.

In 2024, with prisons almost full, the government released many prisoners early to relieve pressure on resources that were almost at operational capacity.

Because prisons hold more people than they were designed for, many prisoners share cells built for fewer people.

The chart shows the share of prisoners held in crowded cells since 2000. Around one in four prisoners are held in crowded cells.

The chart below shows the imprisonment rate — the number of prisoners per 100,000 people — across UK nations.

Scotland, and England and Wales, have similar rates of around 140 to 150 per 100,000 people. Northern Ireland's rate is lower, at around 100 per 100,000.

How do imprisonment rates in the UK compare internationally?

The chart shows the number of people in prison per 100,000 population across a selection of high-income countries.

The UK has relatively high imprisonment rates, although they're still well below the United States. Rates are higher than in most European countries.

Most prisoners are men. Women make up 4% of the prison population, at around 3,500 people.

That share has changed a lot over the past century. In 1900, 17% of prisoners were women.

You can use the chart option to see the total number of men and women in prison.

The prison population is getting older.

In the chart you can see the share of prisoners aged 50 or older. This has increased from 7% in 2002, to 19% in 2026.

Using the chart option, you can see further breakdowns by age. There are more than twice as many over-60s as there are under-21s.

Violence against the person is the most common offence among sentenced prisoners: around one in three are serving a sentence for violence. Sexual offences are the next most common, at more than one in five.

The chart shows the number of prisoners by offence since 2015.

Not everyone in prison is serving a sentence. Many are on remand, which means they're awaiting trial, or are convicted but haven't yet been sentenced.

In June 2026, over 15,000 prisoners were on remand, up from around 9,000 in 2019.

A further 12,000 had been released on licence and then recalled to prison.

The largest group are people serving long sentences of four years or more.

Prison sentences have been getting longer.

In the chart, you can see the average length of sentences by offence type. "All offences" is the average across all types. This average is now at around 20 months, up from 14 months in 2010.

Sentences for sexual offences have increased the most.

This data does not include life sentences.

Most people serving a fixed-length prison sentence don't spend all of it in prison. They are often released part-way through, and spend the rest of that time on licence in the community, where they can be recalled to prison if they break agreed conditions.

On average, for most of the past decade, people released from prison had served around 60% of their sentence. This fell to 52% in 2025, after the government changed the release point for many sentences in 2024.

When people are released depends on their sentence:

1. Most fixed-length sentences: released at the halfway point until September 2024, then after 40%. From October 2026, under the Sentencing Act 2026, most are released after one-third, with the change phased in until June 2027.

2. Serious violent and sexual offences: sentences of four years or more for the most serious offences were released at two-thirds; most move to halfway under the Sentencing Act 2026. Some offences, such as rape and manslaughter, are excluded and keep their existing release point.

3. Extended sentences and many terrorist offences: people can be released by the Parole Board from two-thirds of the custodial term, and must be released at the end of it.

4. Life sentences and IPP: people serve a minimum term set by the judge, and can then only be released if the Parole Board decides it is safe.

The cost, per year, to hold someone in a public sector prison in England and Wales in 2025 was almost £57,000.

The chart shows how this cost has changed since 2010, adjusted for inflation (there is also the option to see this not inflation-adjusted).

Prison costs fell in the early 2010s, but have risen since then.

The UK government and its devolved governments spent £8.4 billion on prisons in 2025/26.

That's the highest figure over the last two decades, after adjusting for inflation.

If you switch to the chart option "Share of public spending", you can see that this was equivalent to around 0.7% of the country's public spending.

The prison population for England and Wales comes from the Ministry of Justice's Offender Management Statistics, which count everyone held in prison, including people on remand, people recalled to prison and immigration detainees held in prisons. Most breakdowns are snapshots on 30 June each year.

Capacity figures come from the Ministry of Justice's weekly and monthly prison population bulletins.

Sentence lengths come from the Ministry of Justice's Criminal Justice System statistics, and cover sentences given by the courts. Time served comes from records of people released from prison.

Scotland and Northern Ireland publish their own prison statistics, which are shown where they're comparable.