Update report Labour Force Survey Transformation

Overview

At the time of this report, statistics from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) remain as official statistics in development.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS)’s labour market overview is a compendium release, using a mix of administrative and survey sources for its estimates. The LFS remains the main source of data about the employment rate, the unemployment rate and the inactivity rate across the UK.

In February 2025, we published an update report on statistics from the LFS. We gave ONS twelve recommendations for how it can continue to support the transformation of the LFS into a new online survey.

Why we did this review

The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) has been periodically reviewing labour market statistics from the Labour Force Survey (LFS), as well as ONS’s ongoing activity to transform the survey to include online data capture, the Transformed Labour Force Survey (TLFS).

Following our update report in 2025, we have continued to look at how ONS is progressing with the transformation of the LFS into two surveys. The first survey, to replace the LFS, is a quarterly online survey for households asking questions covering labour market topics, such as employment and unemployment. It is called the TLFS Core. The second survey, planned to replace the current Annual Population Survey (APS), is an annual online survey covering wider themes, such as socio-demographic information. It is called the TLFS Plus.

This current report reflects on ONS’s progress so far and brings together feedback shared by users in autumn 2025 and spring 2026. As well as reviewing published material, to help us develop our judgements, we have been speaking to a range of users of these statistics and have observed user workshops. These user views are captured throughout this report. The users we spoke with included officials from UK central government departments and the devolved governments, researchers from think tanks and other public bodies. A list of organisations we engaged with can be found at the end of the report.

Highlighted findings

ONS has improved its communication with users by publishing detailed updates about LFS quality and the development of the TLFS Core and Plus surveys. Users value these updates and the opportunities for engagement through various user groups and forums. Many APS users have noticed more engagement with them, especially recently, but some feel that the level of engagement is still not satisfactory

In its April 2026 update, ONS set out the considerations it is discussing with stakeholders with regard to publishing experimental TLFS data. ONS also said that it will assess, in July 2026, when it is likely transition to the TLFS and has explained why it is considering 2027 as the most likely transition date. Many users emphasised that the online transition of the Labour Force Survey is just one step, and they appreciate that ONS’s Plan for Economic Statistics covers the developments for labour market data more broadly.

Dual-running the LFS and TLFS Core continues to strain resources, and ongoing methodological refinements and processing improvements need to be resolved before a full transition to the TLFS Core. ONS is undertaking work to assess the impact of the transition to online data, for example, discontinuities and mode effects, and will publish the results in future update articles.

Whilst the achieved sample size for the LFS increased in 2025, leading to more-precise estimates at the UK level, the sample size does not yet support more-detailed regional or devolved analyses. Users also noted that sample attrition remains high and that some longitudinal series have experienced breaks. ONS is continuing to publish information about the quality of the estimates from the LFS.

Risks remain around the development of coherent UK labour market estimates, given the divergence of work on the respective labour force surveys by ONS and the Northern Ireland Statistics Research Agency (NISRA). But an approach to maintain UK data outputs as NISRA transitions to its transformed survey has now been agreed.

Our judgement

ONS has fully met four of the twelve recommendations from our 2025 update report, and has partially met the remaining eight, as detailed in the section Progress against recommendations. ONS has been increasing the response for the LFS and prioritising the design of the transformed survey. There has been encouraging progress in communication, engagement and development of the TLFS Core, and we recognise the effort invested in these areas.

There remain challenges to overcome in continuing to deliver the TLFS programme. Extended dual running of the LFS and TLFS continues to strain resources. ONS is focusing on ensuring that methodological and design developments are delivering improvements. To strengthen user confidence in the transition to the TLFS, ONS should publish a plan outlining broader user engagement and communication as it nears the transition and continue its work to overcome the remaining methodological and processing challenges, completing the remaining recommendations during 2026.

Next steps

ONS has agreed to continue to publicly report its progress through its quarterly updates on progress and plans for labour market transformation and updates on its Economic statistics and surveys improvement plans.

OSR will publish a report on NISRA’s progress with its labour market statistics transformation.