Ministry of Justice · Offender management statistics quarterly: prison population
Sentenced prison population
70,003people
Sentenced prison population were 70,003 people at 30 June 2026, up 1.1% (752) from 69,251 at 30 June 2025.
▲ 1.1% · +752 against June 2025 (year on year)
- Ministry of Justice snapshot
- June 2026
- published 30 July 2026
- Table 1.Q.1
- row “Sex=Male and female; Age group=All ages; Custody type group=Sentenced”
- column “30 June 2026”
- cell value 70003
June 2025 to June 2026
Breakdowns
What this measures
The number of people held in prisons in England and Wales under sentence, including recalls, at the end of each month.
What this doesn’t measure
People on remand, non-criminal prisoners, or people serving sentences in the community.
Important caveat
These are Ministry of Justice accredited official statistics from Prison-NOMIS and the Digital Prison Service, counted as at the last day of the month shown. They differ slightly from the weekly management bulletin, which counts the population on a Monday. Ethnicity and nationality are as recorded on the prison system and a small share is not stated or not recorded; religion codes were streamlined in June 2025 so earlier religion figures are not comparable. The offence group table (Table 1.Q.5) counts prisoners under an immediate custodial sentence and its total differs by a small number from the Sentenced custody type group in Table 1.Q.1. Figures for secure children's homes and secure training centres may not match the youth custody publication because of different methodologies and snapshot dates.
Revision history
No period of this series has been revised since it was first ingested here. Revisions are recorded automatically when a later release publishes a different figure for the same period.
Source
- Publisher
- Ministry of Justice
- Publication
- Offender management statistics quarterly: prison population
- Release
- Prison population as at 30 June 2026, published 30 July 2026
- Source file
- prison-population-30-June-2026.ods
- File SHA-256
- 9f832c04e75831f86a60287515833feb4504b6a871037542a6d7319cbe8e4c96
- Retrieved
- 2 September 2026
- Sheet
- Table_1_Q_1
- Table
- Table 1.Q.1
- Row
- Sex=Male and female; Age group=All ages; Custody type group=Sentenced
- Column
- 30 June 2026
- Cell value
- 70003
- Geography
- England and Wales
- Unit
- people
- API
- /api/metrics/prison_population_sentenced · /series · /vintages
Related metrics
Government periods
Change during each government, from the level inherited to the last complete period before it left office. Describes the period; does not attribute cause.
- Release
- Prison population as at 30 June 2026 · publication page
- Last updated
- 30 July 2026
- Next release expected
- October 2026 (estimated from the usual cadence)