Creative industries' growth is four times the UK economy average

The economic contribution of the UK creative industries, as measured by Gross Value Added (GVA), grew four times faster than that of the UK economy as a whole, according to provisional official statistics.

Creative industries GVA increased from 2023 to 2024 by an estimated 4.6 per cent, in comparison to the UK economy as a whole, which grew by 1. per cent, with the result that creative industries GVA made up about 5.5 per cent of GVA across the whole economy.

In the longer term, from 2010 to 2024 creative industries GVA also grew faster than the UK economy (60.3 per cent vs. 24.3 per cent).

The DCMS, which published the data, has grouped the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes defining the creative industries into nine distinct subsectors, grouped by policy themes. Looking at these subsectors (also charted in Figure 5):

• The increase in creative industries GVA between 2023 and 2024 was driven by the ‘IT, software and computer services’ subsector which grew by an estimated 8.7 per cent, with the next largest positive contributions from the ‘Film, TV, radio and photography’ and ‘Advertising and marketing’ subsectors which increased by 4.6 per cent and 2.1 per cent respectively.

• The largest relative increases in creative industries GVA from 2023 to 2024 were the ‘IT, software and computer services’ subsector, and the ‘Architecture’ subsector, which grew by an estimated 8.7 per cent and 6.8 per cent respectively.

• ‘IT, software and computer services’ is the largest subsector component of the Creative Industries by GVA, contributing an estimated £62.4bn in 2024. It is more than twice the size of the next largest subsector ‘Advertising and marketing’ (£24.3bn).

The cultural sector GVA grew by an estimated 2.4 per cent from 2023 to 2024, compared to the UK economy as a whole which grew by 1 per cent. In the longer term from 2010 to 2024, culture GVA grew slightly faster than the UK economy (25.4 per cent vs. 24.3 per cent).

DCMS has grouped the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes defining the cultural sector into nine distinct subsectors, grouped by policy themes. Looking at these subsectors (Figure 7):

• GVA by five of the nine cultural subsectors fell between 2023 and 2024. The increase in cultural sector GVA was almost entirely due to a 4.1 per cent increase in the ‘Film, TV and Music’ subsector.

• The subsectors that saw the largest relative growth in cultural sector GVA were the ‘Radio’ subsector which grew by an estimated 11.8 per cent and the ‘Crafts’ subsector which grew by an estimated 4.9 per cent.

• The ‘Film, TV and Music’ subsector remains the largest cultural subsector in size economically, contributing an estimated £23.8bn to the UK economy in 2024. It is more than twice the size of the next largest subsector ‘Arts’ (£11.4bn).