The shape of the sector
How large are registered charities in England and Wales?
CharityCompare analysis · register extract · England and Wales
- Income of £100,000 or less
- 73.3%
- of records with an eligible income figure
- Income figures analysed
- 162,736
- England and Wales · linked records excluded
119,314 records report latest income of £100,000 or less. The denominator is 162,736 parent records with a disclosed, non-negative income figure. The figures cover different accounting periods.
Latest reported income by band
- Zero income7.6%
- £1–£10,00029.0%
- £10,001–£100,00036.7%
- £100,001–£500,00017.3%
- £500,001–£1 million3.7%
- Over £1 million5.7%
| Measure | Records | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Zero income | 12,425 | 7.6% |
| £1–£10,000 | 47,233 | 29.0% |
| £10,001–£100,000 | 59,656 | 36.7% |
| £100,001–£500,000 | 28,081 | 17.3% |
| £500,001–£1 million | 6,020 | 3.7% |
| Over £1 million | 9,321 | 5.7% |
What these findings mean
A directory organised only around familiar national names misses many smaller organisations. Income bands help users compare the scale of an organisation, while service type and location help identify its relevance.
Size does not establish quality, efficiency or impact. A charity with land, research grants or commissioned services can have a very different financial model from a small volunteer group.
Population, methods and limitations
We parsed the Charity Commission’s tab-separated full extract and selected records marked Registered with linked-charity suffix 0. This yields 171,859 parent registrations. We excluded 13,780 registered linked records from the analysis and did not combine Scottish or Northern Irish registers. This is not a count of every UK charity or every unique UK organisation.
For income bands, 9,121 records have no income figure and 2 have an invalid or negative value; both are excluded from the 162,736-record denominator. The source uses latest reported financial periods, so the figures do not form a same-year sector income total. Percentages are rounded to one decimal place.
“Over three years” means the recorded accounts end is strictly earlier than the extract date minus three calendar years. Missing dates are a separate group. The union measure removes overlap between old accounts and explicit zero income and expenditure.
Reproduce using artifacts/web/scripts/build-research.ts. The downloadable methods include the source checksum and exact definitions. Source text SHA-256: 9668bf0061b8d02721619d4adcb990fd8a16243a55498979ca8b3a0759a64e4f.
Download, cite or correct
Suggested citation: CharityCompare, “How large are registered charities in England and Wales?”, analysis of the Charity Commission for England and Wales extract dated 2026-09-08. Cite this page and retain its limitations when using the figures.
Official source extract · Open Government Licence v3 · Report a data or interpretation error.