Sport England's latest Active Lives Adult Survey Report, reveals the number of people playing sport and taking part in physical activity in England is at the highest level on record.

The new figures show that, between November 2023 and November 2024, 63.7% of the adult population across England met the Chief Medical Officers’ guidelines of doing 150 minutes, or more, of moderate intensity physical activity a week.

That’s equivalent to 30 million adults in England playing sport or taking part in physical activity every week – up more than 2.4m from when we first published the survey results in 2016.

The report shows that activity levels have recovered from the huge disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic with an increase in people doing fitness activities from the pre-pandemic period and the continued recovery of swimming and team sports levels post-pandemic.

The Active Lives Adult Survey Report provides a detailed understanding of the factors that influence how likely a person is to be active.

A person’s age, sex, gender, ethnicity, socio-economic group, whether they have a disability or long-term health condition, and the place they live in are all significant factors impacting our relationship with sport and physical activity.

The report shows some positive changes – since the survey began, the number of older adults (aged 55+) who are meeting the Chief Medical Officers’ guidelines has increased from 51% to 58% (2.5m people), while the number of people who are disabled or living with a long-term health condition has increased from 44% to 48% (470,000 people).

However, it also underlines that many longstanding inequalities remain, with women, those from lower socio-economic groups and Black and Asian people still less likely to be active than others. 

View the Active Lives Adult Survey Report 2023 -24 here

Find more details about Sport England's latest Active Lives Survey on their website.

In Lincolnshire, one in six adults are reaching the recommended levels of physical activity.

• 57.2% of adults are classed as active, which means they each the Chief Medical Officers recommended levels of 150 minutes of activity a week
  
• 13% are fairly active, doing between 30 and 149 minutes of activity a week
  
• 29.8% are classed as inactive doing under half an hour of moderate activity each week.

Find out more about the Chief Medical Officer's guidelines for activity levels here.

We're continuing our work with local strategic partners, stakeholders and communities across the county to achieve positive change for residents, and tackle levels of physical inactivity through the Let’s Move Lincolnshire strategy, with a particular focus on those facing the greatest barriers to being active.

As part of our commitment to supporting those communities facing the greatest health inequalities and barriers to being active, we have recently received a commitment of additional funding from Sport England for 'Place based' work in Boston and East Lindsey. This additional Place based funding, is part of £250million investment into the heart of communities across England, designed so that those in greatest need are able to be physically active. Find out more about our work in place here.

Find local insight from previous surveys and research on our knowledge hub.