The UK is getting older, and the care market is growing with it
The number of people aged 85 and over is projected to rise from 1.7 million to about 3.1 million by the mid-2040s. That is the most predictable demand curve in the UK economy, and a lot of businesses sit downstream of it.
Watch: They have already been born
The most predictable number in UK business planning is how many very old people there will be, because they have already been born.
There were about 1.7 million people aged 85 and over in the UK in mid-2020, roughly 2.5% of the population. ONS projections put that at about 3.1 million by mid-2045, roughly 4.3%. Nearly double, inside twenty-five years.
Why this number is unusually reliable
Most business forecasts depend on things nobody can predict. This one mostly does not.
Everyone who will be 85 in 2045 is alive today and is 65 now. The projection still has to make assumptions about how long people live and about migration, so it is not a certainty. But compared with forecasting interest rates or consumer demand, it is about as solid as planning data gets.
Two forces drive it: people are living longer, and the large group born in the 1960s is now reaching old age.
What it looks like today
Deaths registered in England and Wales in 2025 came to 570,988, up 0.4% on 2024.
Alongside that, the age-standardised mortality rate fell to its lowest level since the series began in 1994. Those two facts sit together comfortably: more deaths in total, because there are more old people, while the risk of dying at any given age keeps falling.
The leading cause of death was dementia and Alzheimer's disease, with 72,272 deaths registered in 2025, or 12.7% of the total. That single fact shapes the care market more than any other, because dementia care is intensive, long-running and hard to deliver at home.
Growing market, ageing fast. Here is who is in it.
Tell us the kind of company you sell to. We find them on the public record, check the website and the email, and hand you the list. It takes about two minutes instead of an afternoon.
Who sits downstream of this
Far more businesses than "care homes".
The obvious ones are residential care, nursing homes and home care providers. Behind them sits a long supply chain that grows with the same curve:
- Equipment: hoists, beds, mobility aids, adaptations.
- Building work: wet rooms, ramps, stairlifts, extensions for live-in family carers.
- Services: catering, laundry, cleaning, waste, staffing agencies.
- Professional: accountants, insurers, recruiters and the people who handle the paperwork.
- End of life: funeral services, probate, estate clearance.
If you sell any of those, your market is expanding for reasons that have nothing to do with the economy.
The honest caveat
Rising demand does not automatically mean thriving businesses.
Care is heavily shaped by public funding, staffing shortages and regulation. A sector can have more customers every year and still be hard to run at a profit, and parts of UK care look exactly like that. Plenty of care businesses close.
So treat the demographic curve as the demand side of the story only. The supply side, meaning how many care firms exist and how long they last, is a separate question, and it is one the public record can answer directly. The general method is in UK business survival rates by industry.
How to size it where you actually sell
Three steps, all on free data.
1. Pick the trade codes. Residential care, home care and the supply trades each have their own codes. Our SIC code guide covers how to find them. 2. Draw your area. Ageing is not spread evenly. Coastal and rural areas skew far older than cities, so a national projection understates some markets badly and overstates others. 3. Count the firms. How many care businesses actually operate in your patch, and how old are they? That is a fact about today, not a projection.
The other half of the shift
A rising number of very old people and a falling birth rate are the same demographic story seen from both ends, and they pull business demand in opposite directions. The childcare side is covered in the UK birth rate is falling.
Where these figures come from
Population figures are ONS national population projections; the 85-and-over comparison runs from mid-2020 to mid-2045. Death registrations are from the ONS death registration summary statistics for England and Wales, 2025, which are provisional.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Put names to the demand
A projection tells you the market is growing. It does not tell you who to call.
Leadistry reads the live UK public record, so you can pick care and its supply trades, draw your area, and get the actual firms, each with a working website and a verified business email.
Counting is free. Start free with 25 leads.
Common questions
How many people aged 85 and over are there in the UK?
There were about 1.7 million in mid-2020, roughly 2.5% of the population. ONS projections put that at about 3.1 million by mid-2045, roughly 4.3% of the population.
What is the leading cause of death in England and Wales?
Dementia and Alzheimer's disease, with 72,272 deaths registered in 2025, which was 12.7% of all deaths.
Is the UK care market growing?
The demand side is growing and is unusually predictable, because the people who will need care in twenty years are already alive. Whether individual care businesses grow depends on funding and staffing, which is a separate question from demand.