How many New Mosques in England over the past 10 years
Executive summary
There is no single, authoritative count in the available sources for how many "new" mosques have opened in England over the past ten years; the best recurring dataset is the MuslimsInBritain directory, which lists 2,183 UK masjids/mosques as of 31 July 2025 but does not give a clear ten‑year net of newly opened mosques in England specifically [1]. Reporting and specialist projects show many individual builds and conversions — from purpose‑built complexes to repurposed churches and halls — but sources disagree on definitions and timespans [2] [1] [3].
1. What the numbers mean: different datasets, different questions
Counting "new mosques" depends on definitions: MuslimsInBritain’s comprehensive directory gives a snapshot of 2,183 UK masjids/mosques and 1,162 other locations (proposed or no longer used) as of July 31, 2025, but it does not present a simple “opened in last 10 years in England” figure [1]. Other lists and commercial scrapes (ByteScraper) claim roughly 2,300 mosques in England as of late 2025, but these are aggregated lists for outreach rather than historical openings and do not break out a ten‑year increment [4]. Historic or academic sources chart long‑term growth but not a neat decade total [5] [6].
2. Conversions vs purpose‑built: the raw imperial of "new" places of worship
Many "new" mosques in modern Britain are conversions of existing buildings — warehouses, halls or former churches — rather than newly constructed purpose‑built mosques. Press and commentary note waves of conversions and some estimates of dozens to hundreds of adaptive reuses over time, but such figures are inconsistent and contested: one online piece claimed over 3,500 Christian worship centres were repurposed into various uses (including mosques) over ten years, a dramatic claim that needs scrutiny because it conflates many different outcomes and is not corroborated by other datasets in the file [2]. Historic reporting as far back as the early 2000s already signalled plans for dozens of purpose‑built mosques — but planned projects and completed openings are different measures [3].
3. Local examples and high‑profile builds show uneven geography
Individual projects highlight that some regions have seen new mosque construction recently: the South Lakes Islamic Centre began building a £2.5m mosque on the edge of the Lake District in 2025 (reported as “first mosque” for that area) and UKIM lists multiple new mosques under construction in places such as Leeds, Portsmouth, Sheffield, Newcastle upon Tyne, Nelson (Lancs) and Boston (Lincs) [7] [8]. These examples show growth concentrated where local communities and funding support construction, not a uniform national boom [7] [8].
4. Methodological caution: misused claims and disputed tallies
Fact‑checking organizations have previously warned against simplistic claims (for example, viral assertions about hundreds of church closures matched by hundreds of new mosques in London) because different studies count congregations, buildings, conversions and closures using incompatible methods (Full Fact’s check of London claims illustrates this problem) [9]. MuslimsInBritain is widely cited as the most detailed informal register, but it is a voluntary, crowd‑sourced database and admits lag and coverage limitations [1] [10].
5. What you can reliably say, and what's not found in reporting
Reliable claims from the available sources: MuslimsInBritain lists 2,183 UK masjids/mosques as of 31 July 2025 [1]; commercial lists put roughly 2,300 mosques in England by late 2025 but do not distinguish new openings from existing sites [4]. Sources do not provide a validated count of "how many new mosques opened in England in the past ten years" as a single figure — that precise metric is not present in current reporting (available sources do not mention a ten‑year new‑mosque total for England).
6. How to get a firmer answer
To produce a defensible ten‑year count you need a consistent definition (opened vs registered vs repurposed), a temporal cut‑off and a primary dataset such as MuslimsInBritain’s annual snapshots or government charity/land‑use/ planning records cross‑referenced by date. The MuslimsInBritain site publishes yearly snapshots (noted by the site itself) and would be the best practical starting point to compile year‑by‑year openings — but that work is not summarized by the sources provided here [10] [1].
Limitations and competing perspectives are explicit in the sources: community databases show growth but acknowledge lag and bias [10] [1]; commercial lists inflate accessible totals for business use without historical opening data [4]; media pieces highlight notable projects but do not yield systematic national counts [7] [11]. Use MuslimsInBritain for the most complete existing register and combine it with local planning records to build a defensible ten‑year tally.