How many millionaires left uk in 2025
Executive summary
The most-cited figure for 2025 is a net loss of approximately 16,500 millionaires from the UK — a headline produced and publicised by Henley & Partners and widely picked up by outlets including Business Insider, FTAdviser and others [1] [2] [3]. That estimate is provisional and contested: independent critics and watchdogs say the number is a very small share of the UK’s millionaire population and that the methodology is opaque [4] [5].
1. The headline: who said 16,500 and why it spread
Henley & Partners’ 2025 Wealth Migration reporting — and associated commentary from New World Wealth — produced the widely quoted figure of a net loss of roughly 16,500 millionaires from the UK in 2025, a number repeated across business and trade press and used to characterise a “record” outflow [1] [2] [3].
2. Why some analysts accept the number
Supporters of the Henley/New World Wealth projection argue it reflects early-2025 patterns in applications for residency, wealth migration intelligence and changes to UK tax and residency rules that encourage wealthy, mobile individuals to relocate — trends that have been documented in Henley’s provisional dataset and covered by financial press [1] [6].
3. Why others caution against straight acceptance
Critics highlight methodological opacity and the small proportional impact on the millionaire population: the Tax Justice Network and others note Henley’s 16,500 represents roughly 0.63% of UK millionaires and that Henley later backtracked or qualified some claims after scrutiny [4]. Independent analyses argue the report may overweight easily tracked entrepreneurs and founders and undercount less-mobile millionaires, producing an overstated “exodus” impression [7] [5].
4. The scale in context: percentage and historical comparison
Even using Henley’s headline, the outflow is a small fraction of the UK’s total millionaire stock — estimates put more than 3 million people with at least £1m in personal wealth and around 702,000 homes worth over £1m, so 16,500 departures would be a sliver of total millionaires rather than a mass flight [7]. Henley frames 2025 as the largest recorded annual net outflow since their tracking began, while other datasets (New World Wealth) show large year‑to‑year swings and point to earlier spikes such as 9,500 in some 2024 estimates, underscoring volatility and measurement differences [8] [9].
5. Who is leaving and where they go — partial signals, not a full map
Reporting and Henley’s commentary suggest many departing HNWIs are concentrated in sectors like finance, professional services and tech, and that popular destinations include the UAE, US, Switzerland and Italy’s tax-friendly regions — but these are aggregated signals from private datasets and residency program applications rather than full population registers [2] [8] [10]. Independent observers warn this profile can reflect sample bias toward mobile entrepreneurs and investors [7] [5].
6. What the figure does and does not prove — the responsible reading
The defensible, evidence-based answer is: leading wealth‑migration trackers reported a net outflow of about 16,500 millionaires from the UK in 2025 and that figure dominated headlines [1] [2] [3]. However, that number is provisional, based on private intelligence and modelling rather than official migration statistics, has been challenged for methodology and scale, and — even if accurate — represents a small percentage of the total UK millionaire population rather than wholesale capital abandonment [4] [5] [7].
7. Short verdict
The best available, widely cited estimate for 2025 is approximately 16,500 millionaires leaving the UK, but that claim is contested and should be read as a provisional, model‑based figure that needs validation against transparent methodology or official statistics before being treated as definitive [1] [4] [5].