While there are plenty of people of faith in Britain, it often feels like we’re more agnostic than the rest of the world. But is that actually true?
It’s a really interesting question, and the answer may not be all that surprising to you (though the history might). According to recent data, Britain’s actually one of the least religious countries in the world these days, which is quite a change from our history as this deeply Christian nation that built cathedrals everywhere and sent missionaries around the globe.
Only 30% of Brits actually believe in God anymore.
The recent numbers paint a pretty clear picture of just how much things have changed here. As of 2024, only about 30% of people in the UK say they believe in God or gods, whilst 38% have no belief in any higher power at all.
That’s quite a change from what you might expect, especially when you think about how many historic churches and cathedrals we have dotted around the country. We’ve basically flipped from being a nation where most people believed to one where more people don’t believe than do.
Christianity’s having a massive decline, while “no religion” is booming.
When it comes to official religious identification, Christianity is still technically the largest religion in the UK at 46% according to the 2021 census, but that’s a massive drop from 59% in 2011. Meanwhile, people identifying as having “no religion” jumped from 25% to 37% in just ten years.
So basically, we’re seeing Christianity shrinking quite rapidly whilst the non-religious population is growing at almost the same rate. If this trend keeps up, people with no religion will soon outnumber Christians in Britain, which would’ve been unthinkable just a few decades ago.
We’re in the global top 10 least religious countries.
What’s really telling is how this compares globally. According to recent global surveys, the UK ranks among the top 10 least religious countries in the world, alongside places like Denmark, Czech Republic, Norway, Hong Kong, Japan, and Finland.
Most of the world is still quite religious, so being in this club of very secular nations makes Britain quite unusual. We’re basically part of a small group of wealthy, developed countries where religion has really lost its grip on society.
We score massively negative on global religiosity scales.
If you look at the numbers more closely, the UK scored minus 23% on a global religiosity scale, where they measured very religious people against very non-religious people. To put that in perspective, highly religious countries like Indonesia scored plus 98% on the same scale.
Basically, we’re literally at opposite ends of the spectrum from the most religious places on earth. When researchers try to measure how religious different countries are, Britain consistently comes out near the bottom of the list.
Church membership has absolutely collapsed over decades.
The decline in active religious practice is even more dramatic than the identification numbers suggest. UK church membership has collapsed from 10.6 million people in 1930 (about 30% of the population) to just 5.4 million by 2013, which is barely 10% of the population.
Think about it this way: in your grandparents’ or great-grandparents’ time, nearly one in three people belonged to a church. Now it’s barely one in ten, and that number keeps dropping every year.
It’s not just about church attendance, it’s actual belief that’s declining.
What’s particularly interesting is that this isn’t just about people drifting away from church attendance whilst still believing. Recent research found that only 49% of Britons said they believed in God, which shows the change is happening at a fundamental level of belief rather than just practice.
In other words, it’s not like people still have faith but just can’t be bothered going to church on Sundays. They’re actually losing the underlying religious beliefs as well, which makes this a much deeper cultural transformation.
Young people especially don’t believe in God.
The generational divide is massive, too. A survey found that two-thirds of British teenagers aged 13 to 18 don’t believe in God, suggesting this trend is only going to accelerate as older, more religious generations are replaced by younger, more secular ones.
This means that in 20 or 30 years’ time, when today’s teenagers are the adults running the country, Britain will probably be even less religious than it is now. The writing’s really on the wall for traditional religion here.
We’re now classed as a “post-religious” society.
When you compare this to other major economies, Britain really stands out. Countries like Germany, Netherlands, and the UK are described as “post-religious” where religious people are now a distinct minority. Even compared to our closest cultural neighbours, the differences are stark.
Being “post-religious” basically means we’ve moved beyond religion being a major force in society. It’s still there for people who want it, but it doesn’t shape our culture, politics, or daily life the way it used to or still does in most countries.
We’re part of a tiny global minority.
This puts Britain in a really unusual position globally. About 85% of the world’s population still identifies with a religion, but Britain is clearly part of that small minority of countries where the non-religious now make up a significant chunk of the population.
So whilst most of the world is still quite religious, Britain has joined this exclusive club of highly secular societies. It makes us quite different from most other countries when it comes to how people think about faith, spirituality, and meaning in life.
The pace of change has been absolutely rapid.
The speed of change has been remarkable, too. According to one analysis, if the rate of Christian decline that happened between 2001 and 2011 continued at the same pace, the number of UK-born Christians would theoretically reach zero by 2067.
Obviously, that’s quite an extreme projection, but it shows just how rapid the change has been. To answer your question directly then, Britain is actually one of the least religious countries in the world now, ranking in the bottom 10 globally. We’re much more similar to Scandinavian countries than we are to most of the world, where religion still plays a major role in people’s lives.
