Updated November 2026 · Report
The State of UK Planning: Q4 2026
A national snapshot of UK planning activity, built from the public planning registers SiteLens tracks across 391 local planning authorities. Figures cover the last 12 months unless stated. Free to cite with a link to this page.
For scale: our 301,064 England records over the last 12 months are up to 95.8% of the 314,200 applications the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) recorded as received across England, district level planning authorities in the year ending June 2026. Up to, not exactly: our count includes county and National Park authorities that the official district-level figure leaves out.
The tracked councils received 345,296 planning applications in the 12 months to 1 November 2026. Across the 58 councils whose monthly counts held steady between April to June 2026 and July to September 2026, applications rose by 4 percent, which is broadly steady. This is a like-for-like measure on those 58 councils only, and it does not apply to the wider tracked total, which grows as we add councils.
Householder applications make up the largest share of the tracked total at 42.2 percent (145,574 applications), followed by Other at 29.1 percent (100,500) and Residential at 11.9 percent (41,028). Commercial accounts for 6.2 percent, Institutional 3.2 percent and Infrastructure 2.7 percent. Of the total, 10,297 were major schemes and 334,999 were minor schemes, and 9,625 schemes were valued above 1 million pounds, of which 5,557 were valued above 5 million pounds.
By share of applications across the councils we track, the South East is the most active region at 17.2 percent, followed by Greater London at 16 percent, the South West at 12.2 percent, the East of England at 11.8 percent and the North West at 9.2 percent. Across the councils we track, 89 percent of decisions were approvals, with 129,271 decisions made over the 12 months and a median decision time of 56 days. Nationally, the Planning Inspectorate's record for appeals decided between July 2016 and June 2026 shows 29.5 percent of 176,461 judged appeals allowed, spanning all appeal types, with planning appeals allowed at 28.8 percent of 100,380 judged and householder appeals at 35.6 percent of 43,434 judged.
The trend: applications by month
Measured like for like on the 58 councils whose monthly counts held steady, with no month more than 30% below or 43% above their usual month, over the six most recent settled months. Councils SiteLens added recently and councils with a gap in collection are left out. A month counts only once a fortnight has passed since it ended, because councils publish late, and the panel is redrawn each edition. Across the panel, July to September 2026 ran broadly level with April to June 2026 (+4%).
Applications validated per month across the 58 councils in the like-for-like panel.
How appeals go
When a council refuses an application, the applicant can appeal. In England those appeals are decided by the Planning Inspectorate rather than by the council, and the Inspectorate publishes its own casework record. Across 176,461 appeals judged either way (appeals decided 2016-07 to 2026-06), 29.5% were allowed, meaning the council’s decision did not stand. These figures span several years of casework and are not a reading of the last 12 months.
The headline mixes small householder cases with major planning appeals, and those behave very differently, so it is the wrong number to judge a single council by. The rate for each kind of appeal is below; it is the baseline each council’s own record is measured against on its SiteLens council page.
| Appeal type | Cases | Judged | Allowed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Planning Appeal | 102,067 | 100,380 | 28.8% |
| Householder (HAS) | 44,540 | 43,434 | 35.6% |
| Enforcement Notice | 17,773 | 13,869 | 13.5% |
| Lawful Development Certificate | 5,011 | 4,804 | 36.9% |
| Commercial Appeal Service (CAS) | 4,553 | 4,416 | 33.3% |
| Listed Building Consent & Conservation Area Consent Appeal | 4,182 | 3,693 | 25% |
| Tree Preservation Order | 3,132 | 2,903 | 20.6% |
| Advertisement Appeal | 1,621 | 1,453 | 36% |
| Rights of Way Opposed Orders | 1,027 | 0 | None judged |
| Rights Of Way - Schedule 14D | 835 | 0 | None judged |
| Common Land | 715 | 0 | None judged |
| High Hedges | 469 | 246 | 28.5% |
| Appeal against Enforcement Listed Building Notice/Enforcement Conservation Area Notice | 458 | 360 | 8.1% |
| Environmental | 346 | 0 | None judged |
| Rights Of Way - Schedule 14A | 278 | 0 | None judged |
| Community Infrastructure Levy Appeal | 212 | 206 | 25.2% |
| Commercial Appeals Service (Adverts) | 198 | 196 | 27.6% |
| Rights of Way Modifications | 139 | 113 | 100% |
| Section 106 Agreement | 124 | 118 | 39.8% |
| Called In Planning Application | 80 | 76 | 72.4% |
| Advert Discontinuance | 68 | 68 | 19.1% |
| Hedgerow | 59 | 53 | 17% |
| Tree Replacement Notice | 59 | 47 | 31.9% |
| Section 106BC (Affordable Housing) | 23 | 21 | 71.4% |
| Purchase Notice | 8 | 0 | None judged |
| Marine and Coastal Access | 5 | 0 | None judged |
| Commercial Appeals Service (Planning) | 4 | 3 | 0% |
| No appeal type associated | 2 | 2 | 100% |
“Allowed” is the share of judged appeals the appellant won, so a high figure means the council’s decisions of that kind are not standing. 11,527 cases were judged neither way, having been withdrawn, declared invalid, split or left unrecorded, and are counted but never treated as appeals the council won. Types with no judged case have no rate to publish, and are shown as such rather than as a zero.
The Inspectorate decides planning appeals in England only. 67 of the authorities SiteLens tracks are outside that jurisdiction: Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland each have their own appeal body, so an absence of planning appeals on those councils means a different body decides them rather than that they are never appealed. A few of the Inspectorate’s other functions, such as common land, do run beyond England, and those cases are in the totals above. A further 9 English authorities hold no case of their own here, and that is mostly not because they are never appealed: an authority that has been reorganised, or that we list twice, has its cases counted once under whichever entry the Inspectorate files them against. The rest either had no appeal decided or cannot be matched to the Inspectorate’s records at all. Of the 187,988 cases on file, 185,534 are attributed to an authority we track.
What is being built
The mix of application types over the last 12 months, across the councils we track. Householder applications lead by volume, but the bigger schemes lower down the list are where most supply-chain value sits.
Share of categorised applications, last 12 months.
The scale of the pipeline
Of 345,296 applications in the last 12 months, 10,297 were major schemes: the larger developments that pull in the most trades and suppliers. Where an estimated value band is known, 9,625 sit at £1m or above and 5,557 at £5m+.
| Estimated value band | Applications (12 mo) | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Under £10k | 22,752 | 11% |
| £10k-£50k | 52,831 | 26% |
| £50k-£100k | 76,595 | 38% |
| £100k-£500k | 26,325 | 13% |
| £500k-£1m | 12,915 | 6% |
| £1m-£5m | 4,068 | 2% |
| £5m-£20m | 3,413 | 2% |
| £20m+ | 2,144 | 1% |
| 25k_50k | 1 | 0% |
| null | 2 | 0% |
Submissions are also counted upstream of the registers. The Planning Portal, which operates the national submission service, publishes a quarterly Planning Application Index from its own submission data, and its Q2 2026 edition records 412,130 new homes applied for across England, including London in the year ending June 2026, at 12.9 units per residential application in the quarter. That is a count of homes rather than of applications, so it belongs beside our pipeline figures and not beside our application totals. It publishes ahead of the government statistics, which is what makes it worth citing alongside them.
Where the activity is
The most active regions by application volume over the last 12 months, across the councils we track. A region’s share reflects its size, how much development is moving through its planning system, and how many of its councils we track.
Share of tracked applications by region, last 12 months.
Methodology
Figures are derived from the public planning registers SiteLens monitors across UK local planning authorities. The activity date is when an application was validated (or received, where validation is not recorded). Volumes count applications in the stated window. The approval rate is the share of applications decided in the last 12 months that were granted. The median decision time is the typical span from receipt to decision over the same decisions. The trend compares the latest three settled months with the three before, like for like: only councils with no month in the six more than 30% below or 43% above their usual month are included, and a month counts only once a fortnight has passed since it ended, because councils publish late. Months are not adjusted for working days or bank holidays, so a change under 10% either way is shown as broadly steady. Coverage expands as more registers are tracked, so the tracked totals are a floor, not a complete count. For the detail behind these numbers, see our UK planning statistics by council or explore any authority on its SiteLens council page.
The appeal figures are not ours. They come from the Planning Inspectorate’s own Casework Database, published quarterly on GOV.UK: 187,988 cases with a decision date, appeals decided 2016-07 to 2026-06. Planning appeals in it are English; a small number of its other casework types run across England and Wales. A rate is measured over the cases judged either way, never over every case on file. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
National comparators: MHCLG, Planning applications in England: April to June 2026 (year ending June 2026, England, district level planning authorities), published 2026-09-24, Open Government Licence v3.0. Planning Portal (TerraQuest), Planning Application Index, Q2 2026 (year ending June 2026, England, including London), published 2026-08-03.
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