Online Seller Survival Index.
34.5% of UK retail enterprises born in 2019 were still trading five years later, against a 38.4% all-industries average. Sourced from the ONS Business Demography release, and read alongside our Online Seller Business Index.
Table 4.2 last published 2025-11-20. Published under Open Government Licence v3.0.
How long UK retail enterprises last
Source: ONS Business Demography, Table 4.2. Retail broad industry group, all UK enterprises (sole traders, partnerships and companies registered for VAT or PAYE).
Of retail enterprises born in 2019, still active five years later.
All-industries 5-year survival for the same cohort was 38.4%. Retail trails the wider economy.
The most recent cohort published. First-year survival tracks close to the 93.4% all-industries figure; the gap opens up from year 2 onwards.
The survival curve: 2019 birth cohort
Of every 100 retail enterprises that started trading in 2019, the chart tracks how many were still active at each anniversary, against the same measure for all UK industries combined.
Survival by birth-year cohort
Each row is a different birth-year cohort, tracked independently. More recent cohorts have fewer years of data available; a dot means that survival year has not yet elapsed and ONS has not yet published it.
| Birth year | Births | 1yr | 2yr | 3yr | 4yr | 5yr |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 31,935 | 94.3% | 74.6% | 51.8% | 40.6% | 34.5% |
| 2020 | 34,630 | 86.4% | 72.2% | 48.4% | 39.0% | · |
| 2021 | 38,865 | 92.8% | 66.3% | 48.7% | · | · |
| 2022 | 29,420 | 89.6% | 64.1% | · | · | · |
| 2023 | 26,730 | 92.2% | · | · | · | · |
Row figures are for the Retail broad industry group only. All-industries comparison figures are in the CSV download below.
1-year survival rate over time
The one figure available for every cohort in the series is 1-year survival. Retail has stayed in a relatively narrow band across the published cohorts.
Methodology
Data licence: ONS data is published under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Download the survival data (CSV)
Cite as: Online Seller Survival Index, compiled from ONS Business Demography Table 4.2 (Open Government Licence v3.0). Published by Ecommerce Finance, data generated 2026-07-23.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Online Seller Survival Index measure?
It tracks cohorts of newly-born UK enterprises in the Retail broad industry group (businesses registered for VAT or PAYE in a given year) and measures what percentage are still active 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 years later. The data comes from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Business Demography release. Each birth-year cohort is tracked independently, so the most recent cohorts only have 1 or 2 years of survival data published so far.
Why 'Retail' and not online retail specifically?
ONS Business Demography publishes enterprise survival by broad industry group, not by 5-digit SIC code. Retail is the finest official survival cut available, and it mixes physical shops, market stalls, mail-order and internet retailers together. There is no official UK survival series isolating SIC 47910 (online retail) alone. We flag this clearly rather than implying more precision than the source data supports. Our companion asset, the UK Online Seller Business Index, does isolate SIC 47910 for company incorporation and dissolution counts, which is a different (and more precise) measurement of a different thing: registered companies, not enterprise survival.
Does retail survive worse than the UK average?
Yes, on this measure. Of the 31,935 retail enterprises born in 2019, 34.5% were still active five years later, against a 38.4% average across all UK industries: a gap of -3.9pp. The gap is small in year 1 and widens by year 5, consistent with a sector that has low barriers to entry (easy to start selling) but faces intense price competition, thin margins and high closure rates once initial trading momentum fades.
How does this relate to the Online Seller Business Index?
The two assets measure different things from different sources and should not be combined into one figure. This survival index uses ONS enterprise data (which includes sole traders and partnerships, not just companies) tracked by birth-year cohort. Our Online Seller Business Index uses Companies House data (limited companies and LLPs only, SIC 47910 specifically) and reports incorporations, dissolutions and a register-snapshot active rate. Read together, they give a fuller picture: the Companies House data shows accelerating incorporated-seller churn since 2022, and this ONS data shows that retail as a whole has a below-average long-run survival rate even before that churn wave.
Where does this data come from?
The Business Demography release from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), Table 4.2, 'Survival of newly born enterprises, broad industry group.' It is published under the Open Government Licence v3.0 and updated annually, typically in November. Figures are control-rounded to the base 5 by ONS.
Building a retail business that lasts?
Retail survives at a below-average rate over five years. Cash-flow discipline, correct VAT registration timing and a clean sole-trader-vs-limited-company decision are the factors within your control.