In 2006 UK education spending was less than £70 billion, and education spending was increasing steadily, year on year, reaching £91.5 billion in 2011. In the rest of the 2010s the education budget remained steady at about £85 billion per year. Since COVID, education spending has increased significantly. For the year ending March 2025 education spending was £118.7 billion.

In terms of Gross Domestic Product UK education spending was 4.7 percent of GDP in 2006, increased as a percent of GDP till the peak year of 2010 when education spending was 5.7 percent of GDP. In the 2010s education spending declined, descending to 4 percent GDP in 2020. For the year ending March 2025 education spending was 4.1 percent GDP.

UK Education Since World War II

Chart S.23t: UK Education since 1947

After World War II UK education spending increased rapidly, peaking at 4 percent of GDP in 1949 before being sharply reduced to 3.3 percent GDP in 1951.

Starting in 1956 education spending began a long increase, reaching 5.35 percent GDP in 1968. It then resumed a slower growth, reaching 5.6 percent of GDP in 1973 before blowing off at 6.5 percent GDP in 1975 in the inflation of the 1970s.

Starting in 1976, at 6.1 percent GDP education began a secular decline through 15 years that bottomed out in 1989 at 4.2 percent of GDP. Education spending then rose to 4.9 percent GDP in 1995 before declining to 4.4 percent GDP in 2000.

In the 2000s education spending increased as a percent of GDP, peaking at 5.8 percent GDP. After the Great Recession education spending has declined to 4 percent GDP in 2020.

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Spending Data Sources

Expenditure data since 1983 comes from HM Treasury’s Public Expenditure Statistical Analysis reports.

Detailed table of spending data sources here.

Gross Domestic Product data comes from measuringworth.com.

Central government spending data begins in 1692.

Local authority spending data begins in 1868.

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Data Sources for 2016_2026:

Sources for 2016:

GDP: OBR EFO supp. economy tables
Spending: HM Treasury PESA
Debt: OBR Public Finances Databank

Sources for 2026:

GDP: OBR EFO supp. economy tables
Spending: HM Treasury PESA
Debt: OBR Public Finances Databank

> spending data sources for other years

PESA 2025 Update

On July 23, 2025, HM Treasury published its Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses (PESA) for 2025. ukpublicspending.co.uk uses the PESA tables of public spending at the "sub-function" level as its major data source for UK public spending.

ukpublicspending.co.uk has now updated its spending tables using data from PESA 2025. The update includes outturn spending data for 2023-24, and plans data for 2024-25. ukpublicspending.co.uk uses PESA's Table 6.4 for Central Government expenditure, Table 7.4 for Local Authority expenditure, and Table 8.3 for Public Corporation capital expenditure.

Since HM Treasury does not provide plans estimates for future Local Authority spending, ukpublicspending.co.uk provides "guesstimates" instead. This is done by extending the percentage increase in spending between 2023-24 and 2024-25 for each sub-function for the plans year. It is assumed that local authority spending reductions will not carry through to plans years.

Country and Region spending has been updated up to 2023-24. These are obtained from Chapters 9 and 10 in the PESA document.