Business growth continues to falter as just 2% of UK start-ups reach £1m turnover since 2020
2 April 2025
Small business growth in the UK has continued to decline since the pandemic, and urgent action is needed if the Government is to meet its ambitions to boost growth, a new report by the Enterprise Research Centre (ERC) reveals.
According to the ERC’s latest State of Small Business Britain report, there are 400,000 more established SMEs in the UK since 2010, but the proportion registering any employment growth fell from 20% to 13% between 2020 and 2023.
Although the UK produces a healthy number of start-ups each year, most do not survive longer term. Only 47% of the 325,811 start-ups registered in 2020 survived for 3 years. The 10-year survival rate for start-ups is just 10%.
