Frequently Asked Questions

If you are a funder:

• Compare and benchmark your organisation against others
• Understand the context your organisation works in
• Inform strategy
• Understand trends
• Identify others to collaborate with
• See the collective impact of groups of funders or collaborations

If you are a charity:

• Inform your organisation’s fundraising strategy
• Understand trends and the context for your fundraising
• Understand how your funding compares to other charities

If you are a researcher or policy maker:

• Understand the scope and scale of grantmaking in the UK
• Highlight the value of the funding
• Combine the data with other data for your own analysis

360Giving can also produce bespoke reports and research based on this data for funders or collaborations. Find out more here.

If you have a question about the data or need help to use it, there is a range of support available, including bookable 1-1 support slots. Find out more on Contact us.

In the geographical section of the 2026 edition of UKGrantmaking, we have highlighted some of the challenges and illustrated approaches to avoid the traps when exploring the geographical distribution of grantmaking. 

While we can track total grantmaking figures using a foundation’s published accounts, those accounts rarely show us exactly where the money goes. One of the few ways to map that geographic distribution is through data publishing using the 360Giving Data Standard.

However, because publishing grants data to the 360Giving Data Standard is voluntary, the picture we get is distorted. The funders who choose to share this data are not spread evenly across the country, meaning the locations we can see reflect data availability rather than the true scope of funding.

For example, when you see a lack of grants to charities in a particular area, it is important to recognise that it is often a reflection of the availability of the data in those areas, rather than a real insight into the distribution of grants. For this reason, we don’t compare the geographical spread of grantmaking between different areas unless only national funders are being analysed, to avoid drawing inaccurate conclusions. 

You can read more about the key challenges to watch out for in the geographical analysis of grantmaking in our blog.

As detailed above and in our blog, one of the challenges in looking at grantmaking data is that we often know where the funder is based and where the recipient organisation is registered, but we don’t always have an informed picture of where the specific funded project will be delivered or where the people supported are located.

This makes it difficult to understand the grantmaking picture geographically, and the picture can be particularly misleading in London where a higher proportion of national and international charities are based, making it difficult to understand funding that is supporting Londoners rather than just received in London. This situation has been further exacerbated in recent years with the increase in organisations moving to remote-working as the majority of registered address services have an address in London.

We focused on London to understand how far this picture was being skewed and how we could better understand the grantmaking in London and for Londoners.

We also focused on London because we already have a higher proportion of funders in London publishing their data using the 360Giving Data Standard as a result of previous data work by London Funders. While there is still more work to do, especially to encourage data sharing from local authorities, the momentum has supported enough data to be available to be looked at meaningfully.

We hope our focus on London for this edition can act as a pilot for approaching further geographical data analysis in the future.

The figures and totals for the grantmakers come from the annual returns, statutory accounts and other reporting from the grantmakers. These will relate to how the organisation is required to account for their grantmaking expenditure, which will differ by the type of funder and regulatory requirements, and the type of grantmaking, financial policies, and how the expenditure should be recognised. These figures are as comprehensive as possible and include all organisations where we were able to find publicly available information for – over 14,000 organisations.

The information on the grant details, such as the number and size of grants, and on the grant recipients, comes from other sources which are less comprehensive in the number of grantmakers, but deeper in scope of the information available. The main source is from the 346 grantmakers who voluntarily published their data using the 360Giving Data Standard by April 2026 when we completed the analysis for this edition. We also supplemented this, where necessary, with data from the DCMS National Lottery Distributors database. While these two sources include the majority of grantmaking by value, they do not represent a picture of all grantmaking.

Even where a funder may have published their data using the 360Giving Data Standard, the value of grants may not match the figures reported in the statutory accounts. We selected all the grants data where the award date was between April 2024 and March 2025. However, the award date from the grant data may differ from when the grant expenditure needs to be recognised in the financial accounts, and the funder’s financial year may differ from the April to March period selected for the grants analysis. In addition, a funder might make multi-year awards, so the grants data might include the value of all the instalments of the grant, but, depending on financial policies, the accounts might only recognise the amount paid out in one year.

For simplicity and clarity, we have not adjusted the figures for inflation when comparing between years. Where we have adjusted figures for inflation in the longer-term trends, for example, the five-year endowment trends, we have provided both the adjusted and unadjusted figures.

For the purpose of UKGrantmaking, we use the average of the monthly Consumer Price Index (CPI) from the Office for National Statistics across the year – so for 2024-25, we used the average between April 2024 and March 2025, which came to 2.4%.

The reason why we take an average for the year is that funders have different financial year ends in their statutory accounts, so taking an annual figure would be a snapshot which would only reflect the position of funders with the specific year end taken. Taking an average across the year smooths the impact of this snapshot.

Where relevant, we have included comparisons and changes in the tables. This is the easiest way to see the changes between the years.

We have included the previous version of UKGrantmaking in the Archive, but the figures are not directly comparable. For example, after previous editions, we were contacted by some organisations requesting changes to their categorisation, or we received feedback that some organisations were missing. These were adjusted in the new edition. In addition, the more comprehensive data available from the Charity Commission for England and Wales, particularly on grants to individuals and families, supported improved analysis, and we “restated” some of the figures for prior years based on the data now available or updated annual accounts.

Organisations were allocated to a single segment based on segmentation from existing research and reports, including previous Foundation Giving Trends reports, the use of UKGrantmaking partners’ membership lists, and feedback and change requests received following the last edition. 

You can view the definitions of the different segments in the Methodology section.

There are a number of grey areas where segments might overlap or where there wasn’t enough information available, so assumptions needed to be made about the segmentation. This means that the segments are indicative only to help understand the picture. If you believe there is an error in the data or allocation of grantmaker to a segment, please let us know by completing this short amendment request form so that we can update it in the next edition of UKGrantmaking.

The data presented on the platform is derived from charity regulator datasets, company and charity accounts, data reported using the 360Giving Data Standard, other open datasets, and desk research. In our methodology we noted the challenges in sourcing the data and some issues with data quality. 

Every effort has been made to ensure the data is as accurate as possible with the information available to us at the time. We welcome feedback on inaccuracies to help us develop and enhance our approach for future editions.

If your organisation has been noted with a value you consider to be inaccurate, has been placed into a segment you consider to be incorrect, or anything else you consider should be changed, please let us know by completing a ‘request for an amendment’ form. We will explore your query and update our records accordingly if an amendment is needed. Amended figures and categories will be included in the next edition of UKGrantmaking.

Please note that UKGrantmaking and the project’s partners do not provide direct grants or funding. Visit the 360Giving’s ‘Using 360Giving data as a fundraiser’ page or book onto a free workshop to learn more about how you can use tools to search for potential funders for your cause.