Dissatisfaction with life in UK unchanged since Covid, official data shows | Economics
The proportion of people in the UK who feel dissatisfied with life has not improved since the pandemic despite an improving economic outlook, official figures show.
The Office for National Statistics said a survey of personal well-being in the UK showed that average life satisfaction remained below its pre-pandemic peak, despite the rate of gross domestic product per person increasing since 2021.
The report also highlights the more recent decline in living standards, highlighting that the UK’s GDP per capita fell in the third and fourth quarters of 2025.
The ONS also said trust in the UK government remained low, with around one in five adults (21.9%) in Britain reporting trust between December 2025 and January 2026.
The statistics body said that after a long period of stability until the mid-2010s, the proportion of people reporting low levels of life satisfaction rose sharply between 2020 and 2021 during the Covid pandemic. This figure reached a nine-year high in the first three months of 2021, when 6.4% of adults aged 16 and over reported feeling very dissatisfied with life.
Since then, the measure has declined slightly, but has remained broadly around 5%, with the latest figures, for the period July-September 2025, showing that 5.1% of adults felt very dissatisfied with life.
The survey showed that people aged 45 to 64 were the most dissatisfied with life, while those aged 30 to 34 reported the lowest proportion of life dissatisfaction.
However, the proportion of adults reporting a very high level of life satisfaction has also increased over the past year, from 25.5% from July to September 2024 to 26.7% over the same period in 2025.
The ONS said people’s sense of life satisfaction increased with GDP per person, but this “diverged sharply” during the pandemic and failed to realign. GDP per person was £10,127 in the last three months of 2025, down 0.1% from £10,135 in the previous quarter, but up 0.6% from £10,071 a year earlier.
Alongside lower life satisfaction, the proportion of adults reporting good or very good health also fell significantly, from 76% at the end of 2020 to 70.9% in the final quarter of 2025. The ONS said this indicated “a sustained post-pandemic decline in general health”. This is consistent with separate statistics that show economic inactivity due to long-term illness has increased since the pandemic.
The figures come as a number of consumer surveys suggest households remain pessimistic about the future, despite inflation falling to 3% in January from 3.4% a month earlier, and interest rates continuing to fall.
A long-running survey by GfK found that British consumer confidence fell for the first time in three months in February due to a rise in the number of people saying they were worried about their personal finances for the year ahead. Similarly, a report from S&P Global said the mood among UK households regarding their finances was “gloomy” in February, with consumers worried about their debts, future financial prospects and savings.
