Economic activity and social change in the UK, real-time indicators: 29 August 2025

• The number of new online job adverts decreased by 1% in July 2025 compared with the previous month and also when compared with July 2024 (Textkernel).

• When asked how your business plans to adapt to future increases in employment costs; 28% of trading businesses responded that they would increase prices, 23% would absorb the cost within profit margins, 10% would reduce the number of employees, and 10% would reduce spending on investment (initial results from Wave 139 of the Business Insights and Conditions Survey).

• The total number of ship visits to major UK ports remained broadly unchanged in the week to 24 August 2025 compared with the previous week, but decreased by 12% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (exactEarth).

• The seasonally adjusted number of daily UK flights remained broadly unchanged in the week to 24 August 2025 compared with the previous week, but increased by 2% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (EUROCONTROL).

• The System Average Price (SAP) of gas increased by 3% in the week to 24 August 2025 compared with the previous week, and the System Price of electricity increased by 1% over the same period (National Gas Transmission, Elexon).

• The number of Energy Performance building Certificates (EPCs) for new dwellings lodged in England and Wales increased by 7% in the week to 24 August 2025, compared with the previous week, and increased by 8% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government).

Notes:

1. Card spending over time is pushed upwards by the impacts of both inflation on value of transactions and cash-to-card conversion.
2. Revolut adjustments to user count are at an aggregate level and as such age bands may not adjust evenly.
3. Indicators with “SA” in the title have been seasonally adjusted.
4. Existing weekly Energy Performance Building Certificate (EPC) data can show sudden spikes when housing associations lodge multiple expired EPCs at once.

The total number of new online job adverts decreased by 1% in July 2025 compared with June 2025 and decreased by 1% when compared with July 2024. Notable decreases were seen in "Skilled agricultural trades", "Protective service occupations" and "Customer service occupations" of 14%, 11% and 8% compared with the previous month, respectively.

The number of new online job adverts decreased in 18 of the 26 occupation groups in July 2025 compared with the previous month. The occupation group that saw the largest percentage increase of new adverts was "Skilled construction and building trades", which increased by 13% compared with the previous month, and increasing by 3% when compared with July 2024.

The occupation groups with the largest decreases were "Secretarial and related occupations" and "Customer service occupations", which decreased by 19% and 16% when compared with July 2024, respectively.

Figure 2: The number of new online job adverts decreased in 6 of the 12 UK countries and English regions in July 2025 compared with June 2025

Volume of new adverts, UK countries and English regions, January 2020 to July 2025, non-seasonally adjusted 

Notes:

1. New adverts represent the total number of adverts that have gone online in the month, calculated by counting the number of adverts that appear for the first time across the calendar month.  

Download the data

The number of new online job adverts decreased in 6 of the 12 regions (includes UK countries and English regions) in July 2025 compared with the previous month.

The largest percentage increase was in the East of England, increasing by 5%, while the largest percentage decrease was in Northern Ireland, decreasing by 7%.

Details on the methods used to compile these estimates are available in our Measuring labour demand volumes across the UK using Textkernel data user guide. 

Our accompanying Textkernel new online job adverts dataset is available, or for further tables using similar methodology and sources by local authority and four-digit SOC, see the Labour demand volumes by Standard Occupation Classification datasets. 

This section lists a selection of data available in this publication. Please note that because of our data sharing agreement with MRI onLocation, we are unable to provide a dataset for our footfall metric. For the full list of available datasets, please see our accompanying dataset page.

Real-time indicator

A real-time indicator provides insights into economic activity using close-to-real-time big data, administrative data sources, rapid response surveys or experimental estimates, which represent useful economic and social concepts.

Seasonal adjustment

Seasonal adjustment is the identification and removal of consistent and systematic variation in time series associated with the time of year. For more information on seasonal variation, and how we implement seasonal adjustment, see Section 2 of our Economic activity and social change in the UK, real-time indicators methodology article.

Official statistics in development

These statistics are labelled as official statistics in development. Until September 2023, these were called "experimental statistics". Read more about the change in our Guide to official statistics in development.

We are developing how we collect and produce the data to improve the quality of these statistics. Find out more in our Economic activity and social change in the UK, real-time indicators methodology article.

Once the developments are complete, we will review the statistics with the Statistics Head of Profession. We will decide if the statistics are of sufficient quality and value to be published as official statistics, or if further development is needed. Production may be stopped if they are not of sufficient quality or value. Users will be informed of the outcome and any changes.

We value your feedback on these statistics. If you would like to get in touch, please email realtime.indicators@ons.gov.uk.

Dataset release dates and intended release frequency

Latest release dates and intended release frequency of our associated datasets are available in this section. Please note that there may be some change to the intended release frequency for a variety of reasons, such as data availability. If you would like further information about any of these datasets, or previous release dates, please email realtime.indicators@ons.gov.uk.

Weekly data release

• Revolut spending on debit cards dataset; updated 21 August 2025.

• Automotive fuel spending dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• Advanced notification of potential redundancies dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• System Average price of gas dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• System Price of electricity dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• Energy Performance Building Certificates (EPC) dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• Weekly shipping indicators dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• Daily UK flights dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• Company incorporations, voluntary dissolutions and compulsory dissolutions dataset; updated 30 January 2025.

Monthly data release

• Monthly Direct Debit failure rate and average transaction amount dataset; updated 14 August 2025.

• Textkernel new online job adverts dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• Value Added Tax (VAT) flash estimates dataset; updated 21 August 2025.

• Renter affordability for new tenancies dataset; updated 7 August 2025.

Quarterly data release

• Sales and jobs in small businesses dataset; updated 7 November 2024.

Strengths and limitations

These statistics have been produced to provide timely indicators of the effect of developing world events on the UK economy and society. We use close-to-real-time big data, administrative data sources, rapid response surveys, or official statistics in development.

The data presented in this bulletin are reviewed and refreshed on a regular basis. Indicators are swapped in and out of the publication based on their suitability and availability.

Seasonality

Seasonal fluctuations are likely to be present in many of these indicators, so caution must be applied when interpreting changes in series that are not seasonally adjusted.