A total of 787,120 UK companies were dissolved in the year to 31 March 2026, an increase of 8.3 per cent on the previous year, according to official Companies House statistics.
Separate accounts show the Bona Vacantia Division of the Government Legal Department received £129m from dissolved companies in England and Wales over the same period, up 24 per cent from £104m in 2024-25.
According to WindDown, the annual dissolution total is the highest in Companies House’s historical series, which runs back to 1939.
The Companies House annual statistical release, published on 25 June 2026, recorded 815,277 incorporations over the same financial year, an increase of 1.67 per cent. The register stood at 5,479,045 companies at 31 March 2026.
Companies House statistics for April to September 2026 show 371,269 companies were dissolved in the six months. Of those, 180,574, or 48.6 per cent, closed voluntarily after their directors applied to strike them off.
A further 174,269, or 46.9 per cent, were struck off compulsorily by the Registrar of Companies, typically because the company had stopped filing accounts or confirmation statements. The remaining 16,426, or 4.4 per cent, were dissolved via liquidation.
Under Companies House guidance, the registrar may begin strike-off proceedings where it believes a company is not carrying on business or in operation. One indicator it cites is that “they have not received annual documents that the company should have sent, like its confirmation statement or accounts”. The guidance says the registrar will try to contact a company to ask whether it is still operating before striking it off.
Dissolutions are counted separately from formal insolvencies. Insolvency trade body R3 reported 28,616 UK corporate insolvencies in 2025.
Under the law, anything a company still owns when it is dissolved, including cash in its bank account, passes to the Crown as bona vacantia, or ownerless property. GOV.UK guidance on closing a company states: “Anything that’s left will go to the Crown.” The guidance adds that this includes payments the company receives after dissolution, such as refunds from HMRC.
The accounts for the Crown’s Nominee show the Bona Vacantia Division processed 100,668 low-value company cases, each involving assets of under £300, in 2025-26. That compares with 69,619 the year before. The accounts say these bulk electronic cases were referred by financial institutions following outreach work.
New company case referrals to the division fell to 29,600 in 2025-26 from 31,500 a year earlier, which the accounts attribute to fewer small-value referrals.
In the same year, £35m was paid back to directors and shareholders of companies that had been restored to the register, compared with £37m in 2024-25.
Directors applying for voluntary strike-off must send a copy of the application within seven days to shareholders, creditors, employees, managers or trustees of any employee pension fund, and any directors who did not sign the form, according to Companies House guidance.
Failing to do so is an offence that can carry a potentially unlimited fine on summary conviction, the guidance states. Where the omission is intended to conceal the application, the penalty rises to up to seven years in prison.
WindDown said directors closing a solvent company should pay final bills, take their final distribution and close the bank account before applying to strike off. It said letting a company drift into compulsory strike-off leaves directors exposed to filing penalties, and that any assets still pass to the Crown.
A WindDown spokesperson said: “Most of these companies were never in trouble. They simply reached the end of their useful life. The official figures show that hundreds of thousands are closed by the Registrar rather than their owners, and that the Crown receives well over £100 million a year from dissolved companies. Closing a solvent company properly is not complicated, but the order of the steps matters.”
Amy Ingham
Amy Ingham is a reporter at Business Matters, covering UK business news with a focus on breaking news, business policy, late payments and insolvency. She joined the magazine in 2026 after completing the NCTJ Diploma in Journalism at Harlow College’s journalism school. Her recent reporting includes British Steel’s nationalisation and its impact on SME suppliers, the decline in late payments by large firms, and Insolvency Service director disqualifications. Reach her at [email protected].
