The Charity Commission received a record number of applications to register as a charity last year, it has confirmed.
The regulator told Civil Society that it received 9,840 applications in the year to March 2025, a 9% increase from 2023-24 when 9,008 applications were made.
However, after assessing the applications made in 2024-25, the regulator registered 5,007 new charities, which was not a record high.
A commission spokesperson told Civil Society that the record number of applications was a reflection of “a strong charitable spirit in this country”.
Types of charities registered
Meanwhile, in the calendar year 2024, a total of 5,157 organisations in England and Wales registered as charities, compared to 4,830 in 2023, according to the commission’s register.
Of the new charities registered in 2024, 1,810 charities were classified under general charitable purposes, 1,560 were education or training charities, and 1,287 were religious charities.
In 2023, 4,830 charities registered with the commission, with 1,775 charities classified under general charitable purposes, 1,545 classified under education or training and 1,166 classified under disability.
Removed charities
The number of charities removed from the register in 2024 also increased to 4,546, from 4,512 the year before, including 111 health-related linked charities merging into Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) Charity.
Those removed last year included 2,062 education or training charities, 1,316 with general purposes and 810 anti-poverty charities.
Education or training charities and those with general purposes were also the types most removed in 2023, with 2,263 and 1,346 removed in that year, respectively.
Meanwhile, 804 health charities classified were removed in 2023.
Charities under the Scottish charity register
Elsewhere, the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) registered 807 new charities in 2023, the most recent year for which data is available, and removed 1,144 charities.
These figures include cross-border charities, with some also registered in England and Wales or in Northern Ireland.
In recent years, the largest gap between the number of charities registered and removed was in 2020, when 814 new charities registered, while 454 charities were removed.
The overall number of charities on the Scottish charity register came down in 2023 for the first time to 25,108, which was a drop of 337 charities from 2022.
This is predominantly because of its work on removing organisations that are no longer active and action on defaulting charities.
OSCR expects the number of charities registered in Scotland to continue to decrease following changes to its powers introduced this year.
Charity closures in Northern Ireland
Meanwhile, the Charity Commission of Northern Ireland (CCNI) recently analysed the reasons for charities’ closures between December 2013 and July 2024.
Some 20% of charities in Northern Ireland cited a lack of members or supporters to enable them to continue to operate, while 19% cited that they closed because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
With a sample of 800 charities that were removed from the register during that period, CCNI found that 14% cited that they have merged with another charity, and 13% cited a lack of sufficient trustees that enable the charity to continue to operate.
Most closures occurred in 2021 and 2022 when 114 and 109 charities closed, respectively, many due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Outside the pandemic years, between 2014 and 2019 and in 2023, the average number of closures reported to the commission was 63.
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