Economic activity and social change in the UK, real-time indicators: 6 November 2025

• The seasonally adjusted number of new vehicle registrations increased by 16% in September 2025, compared with August 2025, and the number of vehicles produced over this period fell by almost a quarter (24%) (Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders). Section 3: Transport

• Total UK retail footfall increased by 1% in the week to 2 November 2025, compared with the previous week, but decreased by 8% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (BT Active Intelligence).

• In our latest Opinions and Lifestyle Survey (OPN), 63% of adults reported that their cost of living had increased over the past month, this was 2 percentage points lower than in September 2025 (65%), but 10 percentage points higher than in October 2024 (53%) (initial findings for October 2025 from our OPN, publishing 14 November 2025).

• The System Average Price (SAP) of gas decreased by 2% in the week to 2 November 2025, compared with the previous week, and decreased by 26% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024, while the System Price of electricity increased by 2% compared with the previous week but decreased by 28% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (National Gas Transmission, Elexon).

• The total number of ship visits to major UK ports increased by 3%, in the week to 2 November 2025, compared with the previous week, but decreased by 7% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (exactEarth).

• The seasonally adjusted number of daily UK flights increased by 5% in the week to 2 November 2025, compared with the previous week, and increased by 4% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (EUROCONTROL).

• The number of Energy Performance Building Certificates (EPCs) lodged in England and Wales for new dwellings decreased by 12% in the week to 2 November 2025, compared with the previous week, but increased by 9% 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. Indicators with "SA" in the title have been seasonally adjusted. Indicators with "NSA" in the title have not been seasonally adjusted but do present seasonality. All other indicators do not present seasonality. 
3. Existing Energy Performance Building Certificate (EPC) data can show sudden spikes when housing associations lodge multiple expired EPCs at once.

New vehicle registrations and production

We are introducing new vehicle registration and vehicle production data in this release. These data are provided by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), a large trade association that represents the UK automotive industry.

Registration data are provided for all cars by sales type (private, fleet, or business), by fuel type, and for light commercial vehicles (LCVs).

Production data are provided for cars and commercial vehicles by destination (home or export).

All figures quoted in this section are seasonally adjusted (SA) unless stated otherwise. Non-seasonally adjusted (NSA) and SA data are available in our SMMT vehicle production and registrations dataset.

The seasonally adjusted number of new vehicle registrations increased by 16% in September 2025 compared with August 2025. Just over a half of all new vehicle registrations in September 2025 were fleet vehicles (vehicles registered to a business with more than 25 registered vehicles), an 18% increase when compared with August 2025.

Business car registrations (vehicles registered to a business with up to 25 registered vehicles) increased by 13% in September 2025 compared with August 2025. Private car and LCV registrations increased by 16% and 9% over the same period, respectively.

Over a half (54%) of all new car registrations (seasonally adjusted) in September 2025 were electric vehicles (battery electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, and hybrid electric vehicles), up from 44% in September 2024, and 33% in September 2022.

Battery electric vehicles were the most common type of new electric vehicle registration in September 2025, comprising almost a quarter (23%) of all new registrations. This was followed by hybrid electric vehicles (16%), then plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (15%). Petrol cars were still a common choice, comprising 42% of all new registrations, but is a decline from 49% in September 2024.

The seasonally adjusted number of new registrations for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles saw the largest growth in September 2025, up by 48% compared with August 2025. New registrations for diesel cars fell by 4% over the same period.

The seasonally adjusted number of vehicles produced in the UK decreased by 24% in September 2025 compared with August 2025. This decrease was partly caused by a cyber incident that paused production at a major manufacturer in September 2025.

The number of vehicles produced in the UK decreased by 41% when compared with September 2024. The closure of a large plant in April 2025 has reduced the number of commercial vehicles produced while the manufacturer restructures and moves production to an alternative site.

Over three-quarters (76%) of the vehicles produced in the 12 months to September 2025 were for export; this proportion fluctuates month-to-month but has remained broadly stable since our data began in January 2019.

This section lists a selection of data available in this publication. 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 30 October 2025.

• Automotive fuel spending dataset; updated 6 November 2025.

• UK retail footfall dataset; updated 6 November 2025.

• Advanced notification of potential redundancies dataset; updated 6 November 2025.

• System Average Price (SAP) of gas dataset; updated 6 November 2025.

• System Price of electricity dataset; updated 6 November 2025.

• Energy Performance Building Certificates (EPC) dataset; updated 6 November 2025.

• Weekly shipping indicators dataset; updated 6 November 2025.

• Daily UK flights dataset; updated 6 November 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 9 October 2025.

• Textkernel new online job adverts dataset; updated 23 October 2025.

• Value Added Tax (VAT) flash estimates dataset; updated 23 October 2025.

• Renter affordability for new tenancies dataset; updated 9 October 2025.

• SMMT vehicle registration and production dataset; updated 6 November 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.