Civil claims took 69.1 weeks to reach trial, with Oxford the slowest of the busier county courts
Ministry of Justice figures for April to June 2026 show fast, multi and intermediate track claims took an average of 69.1 weeks from issue to trial. At Oxford the average was 90.4 weeks.
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Defended civil claims in the county courts of England and Wales took an average of 69.1 weeks to get from issue to trial in April to June 2026, according to the Ministry of Justice’s Civil Justice Statistics Quarterly, published on 3 September 2026. The figure covers fast track, multi-track and intermediate track trials.
That compares with 69.5 weeks in the previous quarter and 72.6 weeks in the same quarter of 2025. Before the pandemic, in the same quarter of 2019, the average was 59.0 weeks.
Key points
- Average time from claim issue to trial for fast, multi and intermediate track claims: 69.1 weeks in April to June 2026, against 69.5 weeks in January to March 2026 and 72.6 weeks a year earlier.
- Median time to trial: 55.9 weeks, against 62.0 weeks a year earlier.
- Slowest county court with at least 30 trials in the quarter: Oxford at 90.4 weeks on average.
- Fastest: St. Helens at 47.4 weeks, so a claim at Oxford took 1.9 times as long.
- 28 of the 29 courts measured averaged a year (52 weeks) or more.
- Small claims took 48.5 weeks on average to reach a hearing (median 41.0), against 49.0 a year earlier.
Where the waits are longest
The wait depends heavily on the court. Of the 29 county courts that heard at least 30 fast, multi or intermediate track trials in the quarter, these had the longest average time from issue to trial:
| County court | Average weeks to trial | Trials in quarter |
|---|---|---|
| Oxford | 90.4 | 33 |
| Leeds | 85.9 | 40 |
| Luton | 85.1 | 38 |
| Central London | 84.0 | 291 |
| Croydon | 82.9 | 66 |
| Hastings | 82.4 | 43 |
| Bromley | 78.2 | 45 |
| Uxbridge | 74.9 | 44 |
| Clerkenwell and Shoreditch | 74.0 | 255 |
| Brentford | 71.6 | 41 |
And these the shortest:
| County court | Average weeks to trial | Trials in quarter |
|---|---|---|
| St. Helens | 47.4 | 52 |
| Liverpool | 52.2 | 118 |
| Bradford | 53.6 | 53 |
| Bournemouth and Poole | 54.3 | 38 |
| Romford | 56.6 | 36 |
Nationally, the time splits into two stages: an average of 31.6 weeks from issue to allocation to a track, then 37.5 weeks from allocation to trial.
What the figures mean for firms
For litigators and their clients, the court a claim lands in can add or remove months from a case timetable, with knock-on effects for cost budgets, funding arrangements and settlement pressure. The figures measure averages for cases that reached trial in the quarter, so they describe the queue behind those cases rather than a forecast for a claim issued now.
Method
Figures are from the Ministry of Justice’s published timeliness and workload data for April to June 2026 (release of 3 September 2026). Average and median weeks are as published. Court-level rankings use the published average for each county court and include only courts with at least 30 fast, multi or intermediate track trials in the quarter (from the workload data), because averages over a handful of trials swing widely. Figures are rounded to one decimal place. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.