GDP monthly estimate, UK: April 2023

• Monthly real gross domestic product (GDP) is estimated to have grown by 0.2% in April 2023, after a fall of 0.3% in March 2023.

• Looking at the broader picture, GDP grew by 0.1% in the three months to April 2023.

• The services sector grew by 0.3% in April 2023, following a 0.5% fall in March 2023, and was the main contributor to the growth in monthly GDP in April.

• Output in consumer-facing services grew by 1.0% in April 2023, following a fall of 0.8% in March 2023.

• Production output fell by 0.3% in April 2023, after growth of 0.7% in March 2023.

• The construction sector fell by 0.6% in April 2023, following growth of 0.2% in March 2023.

• There are no revisions to previously published data in this release.

Monthly real gross domestic product (GDP) is estimated to have grown by 0.2% in April 2023 (Figure 1) following a fall of 0.3% in March 2023. Monthly GDP is now estimated to be 0.3% above its pre-coronavirus levels (February 2020).

Looking more broadly, GDP grew by 0.1% in the three months to April 2023 when compared with the three months to January 2023. Services fell by 0.1% in the three months to April 2023, while production and construction grew by 0.2% and 1.6%, respectively.

Output by the services sector grew by 0.3% in April 2023. Production output fell by 0.3% and construction output decreased by 0.6%.

Monthly GDP grew by 0.5% in April 2023 compared with the same month last year. For comparison, monthly GDP grew by 0.3% between March 2022 and March 2023.

Services grew by 0.3% in April 2023, following a fall of 0.5% in March 2023, with growths in 10 of the 14 sub-sectors. Figure 3 shows the contributions from the services sector to GDP in April 2023. Overall, the services sector fell by 0.1% in the three months to April 2023 compared with the three months to January 2023, with falls in 8 of the 14 sub-sectors.

The largest contributor to the rise in services was a 1.0% rise in the wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles sub-sector, which saw growth in all three industries. The wholesale and retail trade and repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles industry was the main contributor to this growth, with a 3.9% growth in April 2023. This follows a fall of 4.1% in March (where the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Trades (SMMT) reported that new car registrations in March were below average pre-pandemic March volumes). There was also growth of 0.5% in retail trade, except of motor vehicles and motorcycles, and a 0.4% growth in wholesale trade, except of motor vehicles and motorcycles.

The next biggest contributor to services output growth in April 2023 was a 1.3% rise in information and communication, following on from a 1.1% fall in March. The industry leading this growth was motion picture, video and TV programme production, sound recording and music publishing activities, which grew by 5.3% in April 2023, after a 6.1% fall in the previous month. This was followed by computer programming, consultancy and related activities, which grew by 1.1% in April 2023 after a 0.8% fall in March.

The largest negative contributing sub-sector to services output was human health and social work activities, which fell by 0.9% in April 2023. This was driven by the human health activities industry, which fell by 1.3% in a month that saw four days of junior doctor strikes (compared with three days in March 2023).

NHS Test and Trace and COVID-19 vaccination programme activity increased by 98% in April 2023 after a rise of 16% in March 2023 but remains significantly lower than its peak towards the end of 2021. A full record of the volume estimates of Test and Trace and vaccination programmes, along with their contribution to GDP growth, can be found in the accompanying dataset.

Consumer-facing services

Output in consumer-facing services rose by 1.0% in April 2023, after a fall of 0.8% in March 2023. Looking at the broader picture, consumer-facing services grew by 0.1% in the three months to April 2023. Consumer-facing services were 8.7% below their pre-coronavirus levels (February 2020) in April 2023, while all other services were 2.0% above (Figure 4).

The largest contribution to the rise in consumer-facing services in April 2023 came from food and beverage service activities, which grew by 2.0%.

The next largest contribution came from wholesale and retail trade and repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles, which grew by 3.9% in April 2023. This follows a fall of 4.1% in March.

Consumer-facing services were 8.7% below their pre-coronavirus levels (February 2020) in April 2023, with 11 of 13 industries lower than February 2020 (Figure 5). Within consumer-facing services, the veterinary activities industry saw the most growth since February 2020 at 42.5% above its pre-coronavirus levels in April 2023. Activities of households as employers of domestic personnel is the furthest consumer-facing industry from recovery, falling to 40.5% below pre-coronavirus levels in April 2023.

More detailed breakdowns on services are available in our Index of Services, UK: April 2023 bulletin.

Production output fell by 0.3% in April 2023, following growth of 0.7% in March 2023 (Figure 6). Manufacturing fell by 0.3% and was the largest contributor to the negative growth in April 2023. Overall, production output increased by 0.2% in the three months to April 2023, compared with the three months to January 2023, primarily led by growth of 0.7% in manufacturing.

The manufacturing sector saw falls in 8 of its 13 sub-sectors (Figure 7) with the manufacture of basic pharmaceutical products and pharmaceutical preparations, which fell by 5.0%, being the largest negative contributor. Followed by manufacturing of computer, electronic and optical products, which fell by 3.8%.

Growth was seen in 4 of the 13 sub-sectors, with manufacture of transport equipment as the largest positive contributor, growing by 2.5%.

Electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply was the only positive contributor to production, growing by 0.6%, with the manufacture of gas, distribution of gaseous fuels through mains, and steam and aircon supply up 0.7% and electric power generation, transmission and distribution up 0.5% in April 2023. The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) produce Energy trends data (XLSX, 120KB), which show that the average temperature in April 2023 was 0.5 degrees lower than in April 2022.

Mining and quarrying fell by 1.9% in April 2023. This was driven by the extraction of crude petroleum and natural gas, with a fall of 2.6% in April after a fall of 0.3% in March 2023.

Water supply and sewerage fell by 0.1% in April 2023, with growth in remediation activities and other waste management services (up 4.3%), waste collection, treatment and disposal activities (up 0.3%), and water collection, treatment and supply (up 0.6%) fully offset by the 1.1% fall in sewerage.

More detailed breakdowns on production are available in the Index of Production, UK: April 2023.

Monthly construction output is estimated to have decreased 0.6% in volume terms in April 2023; this follows two months of consecutive growth, with the previous month of March 2023 being the highest monthly value in level terms (£15,616 million) since records began in January 2010.

The decrease in monthly output came from a decrease in new work (1.0% fall), with a small offset from an increase in repair and maintenance (0.1%) on the month. Five out of the nine sectors saw a decrease on the month.

At the sector level, the main contributors to the monthly decrease were seen in private housing repair and maintenance and private housing new work, which decreased 5.7% and 3.0%, respectively.

Anecdotal evidence received from returns for the Monthly Business Survey for Construction and Allied Trades (MBS) suggested a continued slow-down in private housing, referencing economic worries with customers hesitant to request work. Despite this, similar to last month, some companies across other sectors have again reported an easing in inflation.

Further detail on construction output growth rates, along with new orders in the construction industry and construction output prices, can be found in our Construction output in Great Britain: April 2023 bulletin.

There were some common themes that were anecdotally reported (as part of the Monthly Business Survey for Production and Services) to have played a part in performance across different industries. However, it is often difficult to quantify these effects.

There was anecdotal evidence, reported on monthly business survey returns, to suggest that industrial action in April 2023 had an impact on different industries of varying degrees. This included strikes by junior doctors, teachers and Civil Servants, while no industrial action was held within rail transport during April 2023. The Business Insights and Conditions Survey (BICS) reported that less than 1 in 10 businesses were directly or indirectly affected by industrial action in April 2023.

Contribution to growth

Contribution to growth indicates how many percentage points a sector or industry is adding or removing from a given growth rate, usually headline gross domestic product (GDP) growth.

Gross domestic product (GDP)

A measure of the economic activity produced by a country or region. GDP growth is the main indicator of economic performance. There are three approaches used to measure GDP:

• the output approach 

• the expenditure approach 

• the income approach  

Index numbers

Data relative to a given base value, which typically refers to a year.

Rolling three-month growth

Rolling three-month growth takes the average level of three consecutive months (for example, April, May and June), and compares it with the average level of the previous three months (for example, January, February and March). The rolling three-month growth rate is often used alongside the monthly growth rate, as the latter can be more volatile.

Real GDP

Real GDP excludes any inflationary issues and reflects the changes in volume terms. This can also be referred to as volume estimates of GDP.

For further definitions, please see the Glossary of economic terms.

Further information on measuring the data across our main data sources is available in the following releases:

• Construction output in Great Britain: April 2023 

• Index of Production, UK: April 2023

• Index of Services, UK: April 2023 

There have been large movements in UK gross domestic product (GDP) over the course of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. This is primarily in response to public health restrictions and voluntary social distancing that have been in place over this period. Given the size of these effects, there has been a focus on where the economy is relative to its pre-coronavirus pandemic levels.

In the UK, we produce estimates of monthly and quarterly GDP. However, there are reasons as to why these would not provide the same estimate as to where the economy is relative to its pre-pandemic levels. This primarily reflects that monthly estimate of GDP are based on only the output measure of GDP, while quarterly estimates of GDP reflect the average of the three approaches (output, income and expenditure).

However, the coronavirus pandemic has brought many measurement challenges that have created more uncertainty around our three approaches. This has led to an initial divergence between the output and average estimate, which is then reflected in how we compare monthly and quarterly estimates of GDP. Further information is available in our Measuring monthly and quarterly UK gross domestic product during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic article.

Estimates for the construction industry within monthly GDP will differ to those published in the construction output release as they account for both the outputs produced and inputs consumed by the industry. There are also some coverage differences given the use of the Annual Business Survey in their compilation.

Within the monthly GDP publication, government data are sourced on a quarterly basis; a monthly forecast is used to estimate data for the monthly round until quarterly data are available. While this is a standard practice with many of our data sources, pre-empting the behaviour of a series during a pandemic, in particular for health and education, comes with more uncertainty than usual so caution is advised when looking at the monthly estimates beyond the latest published quarter.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is aware of reclassifications or relocations of companies that may affect these published estimates of GDP and associated breakdowns. It is monitoring the data and will seek to implement any resulting changes into the national accounts as soon as possible.

Quality and methodology information (QMI) on strengths, limitations, appropriate uses, and how the data were created is available in the Gross domestic product (GDP) QMI.

Monthly growth rates can be volatile. This indicator should therefore be used with caution and alongside other measures, such as the three-month growth rate, when looking for an indicator of the medium-term trend of the economy. However, it is useful in highlighting one-off changes that can be masked by three-month growth rates.

The latest comparisons of month on same month a year ago should be treated with caution given the impact of base effects on growth rates because of the economic impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic throughout 2020 and 2021. Such comparisons and growth rates can be found in our accompanying dataset.