UK healthcare marketing statistics for 2026, with sources

Last checked 1 November 2026. Every figure on this page links to the organisation that published it, with its publication date and the period it covers.

This page collects 40 statistics that matter to anyone marketing private healthcare in the UK: NHS waiting lists, private and self-pay activity, how people search and use health services online, advertising regulation, and Google's own figures on AI search. Each one comes from an official or primary source we opened and checked, and the source and date sit next to every figure.

We built it because most "healthcare marketing statistics" lists recycle vendor surveys and US figures with no date. If you quote a number from here, please cite the original source, which is linked in each row. You are welcome to link to this page as well.

How we chose these statistics

• Primary sources only: NHS England, the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the Private Healthcare Information Network (PHIN), Ofcom, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) and Google's own announcements. No agency or software vendor surveys.

• Opened and checked: each figure was read on the source page or report on 1 November 2026. Anything we could not confirm was left out.

• Latest edition: we used the most recent release available on that date, and say so where a newer edition is due.

• UK first: NHS figures cover England unless stated, PHIN figures cover the UK, and Google figures are global.

Jump to: NHS waiting lists and GP access, private healthcare and self-pay, online behaviour and the NHS App, advertising regulation, search and AI.

NHS waiting lists and GP access

Waiting times shape why many patients look at private care. These figures cover England.

Private healthcare and self-pay

PHIN publishes data on private hospital activity across the UK. Its September 2026 update covers January to March 2026, the latest quarter available on 1 November 2026.

How UK adults go online, search and use the NHS App

Ofcom's Online Nation 2025, published December 2025, is the latest edition available on 1 November 2026. NHS App figures are monthly.

Advertising regulation and care quality

Healthcare advertising in the UK is held to the CAP Code by the ASA. These are the ASA's whole-of-market figures, not health only.

Search and AI: Google's own figures

These are global figures published by Google, not UK only.

What these numbers mean for clinic marketing

We draw these points from the figures above. They are our reading, not the sources' conclusions.

• Self-pay patients are a growing audience. PHIN shows self-pay admissions at a record level while insured admissions dipped. Self-pay patients choose their own provider, which makes clear pricing, procedure pages and reviews more important. See marketing for doctors for how consultants can respond.

• Patients research health online, including on the NHS. Ofcom's figures show most online adults use health and wellbeing services online. Your website competes for attention with trusted NHS content, so it needs to be accurate, clear and easy to use. Our healthcare SEO service is built around that.

• AI answers are now part of search. Ofcom reports AI Overviews on about 30% of UK searches, and over half of UK adults use AI tools. How AI tools describe your clinic is worth checking. Our free AI visibility check and healthcare AI search optimisation page explain what we look at.

• Advertising is actively policed. The ASA amended or removed over 22,000 ads in 2025 and now spends much of its effort on proactive monitoring. Health claims need evidence before they are published. Our guide can doctors advertise in the UK? covers the rules.

Statistics we left out

Some figures that appear on other lists could not be confirmed from a primary source on 1 November 2026, so they are not here. They include the share of UK adults who look for health information online (the ONS series that measured this has been discontinued), the number of doctors on the GMC register, counts of CQC-registered independent providers, and the share of ASA complaints about health advertising. We will add them if we can verify them at source.

Using this page

Figures change as new releases come out. NHS waiting list and GP appointment data are monthly, PHIN updates quarterly, and Ofcom and the ASA publish annually. Check the date in each row before quoting it, and use the linked source for the definitive figure. For help turning numbers like these into a plan for your clinic, see our digital marketing for healthcare guide or book a free strategy call.