Ambulance sector

Incidents (data from December 2025)

• There were 846,263 ambulance incidents this month, the highest December figure on record. 
  
  
• There were 85,557 category 1 incidents (life-threatening injuries and illnesses) and 429,416 category 2 incidents. 

Response times and handovers (data for December 2025)

The national ambulance response time targets are seven minutes for category 1 incidents and 18 minutes for category 2 incidents. As part of the plan to recover urgent and emergency care, NHS England adjusted the category 2 target to 30 minutes, on a temporary basis.  

• The average response time across England for category 1 incidents was seven minutes and 59 seconds compared with eight minutes and one second for November. This is faster than the eight minutes and 40 seconds in December 2024, but is still missing the national standard of seven minutes. The last time the standard was met was over four and a half years ago in March 2021. 
  
  
• For category 2 incidents, the average response time was 32 minutes and 43 seconds, compared with 32 minutes and 46 seconds in November. This is shown in Figure 3. This is faster than the 47 minutes and 26 seconds in December 2024 but misses the 30-minute recovery target. 
  
  
• There were 427,626 ambulance handovers where the handover time was known. The mean handover time was 30 minutes 43 seconds, compared with 43 minutes and 31 seconds in December 2024. 

Figure 3
Ambulance response times for category 2 incidents