NHS Activity Tracker: September 2025
12 September 2025
2.27m
A&E attendances in August
27m 3s
category 2 average response time in August
499,830
new referrals to mental health services in July
On the second Thursday of the month, NHS England publish data relating to demand, activity, waiting times and national performance against constitutional standards and recovery targets across the secondary care sector. Each month, we'll take a more detailed look at national and trust level data across the acute, ambulance, community and mental health sectors.
This month’s data release continues to highlight the widespread pressure across sectors. Activity has reached record highs across planned care and response times have improved in the ambulance sector. But demand remains significant, contributing to strain throughout elective and emergency care, mental health and community services. Performance against key targets has been mixed, with some areas showing recovery and others continuing to experience long waits and growing backlogs.
Key points
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A&E: Record high August A&E attendances at 2.27 million. Performance against the four-hour target stood at 75.9%, lower than last year. The number of 12-hour waits rose in August and is nearly 100 times higher than pre-pandemic levels.
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Ambulance: Category two response times met the 30-minute target for the sixth consecutive month with the fastest time in over four years (since May 2021), while category one response times moved slightly closer to the seven-minute standard.
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Cancer: Monthly number of patients recorded across all three cancer pathways (28-day faster diagnosis standard–28-day FDS, 31-day and 62-day) as meeting their respective standards were the highest on record in July. Despite this, the proportion of all patients seen within the 28-day FDS standard (76.6%) dipped slightly compared to last month (76.8%), reflecting high levels of overall demand.
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Diagnostics: A record high 2.61 million diagnostic tests were carried out in July. Despite this, the size of the waiting list remains elevated and is now over 60% larger than in 2019.
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Elective waiting list: The size of the waiting list increased slightly for the second month in a row to 7.4 million cases in July. The number of cases waiting more than 52 weeks for treatment are down by 34% compared to last year.
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Community: The community health services waiting list increased by 9% from last year to a record high 1.2 million in July 2025. Long waits of over 52 weeks for CYP’s community services are now 86% higher than a year ago.
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Mental health: Demand continues to rise, with new referrals to mental health services the highest on record (499,830) and open referrals to adult services at an all-time high. Out of area placements have increased by 38% since last year, highlighting the strain on the system.