Solicitor firm numbers fall to 8,923 as sole practices shrink
SRA figures for August 2026 count 8,923 regulated law firms, down 110 on a year earlier, while the number of practising solicitors rose by 4,917 to 179,054.
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The number of law firms regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority stood at 8,923 in August 2026, down 110 on a year earlier, according to the regulator’s regulated community statistics (updated 15 September 2026). Over the same twelve months the number of practising solicitors rose by 4,917 to 179,054, so the profession is growing while the number of firms it works in is not.
Key points
- Firms regulated by the SRA: 8,923 in August 2026, against 9,033 in August 2025 (down 1.2%).
- Sole practitioners: 1,321, against 1,407 a year earlier (down 6.1%).
- Incorporated companies: 5,261, against 5,192 (up 1.3%), now 59.0% of all firms.
- Practising solicitors: 179,054 in August 2026, against 174,137 a year earlier (up 2.8%).
- Five years earlier, in August 2021, there were 9,950 firms and 1,933 sole practitioners.
Firms by structure
| Structure | August 2026 | August 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sole Practitioner | 1,321 | 1,407 | -86 |
| Partnership | 897 | 962 | -65 |
| Incorporated Company | 5,261 | 5,192 | +69 |
| LLP | 1,416 | 1,436 | -20 |
| Other | 28 | 29 | -1 |
| Total | 8,923 | 9,033 | -110 |
Openings and closures
In the twelve months from June 2025 to May 2026 for which both figures are published, 347 firms opened and 520 closed. The SRA’s breakdown of closures for June 2025 to May 2026 shows 321 firms ceased practising, 100 merged or amalgamated and 66 changed status, out of 520 closures.
Why it matters
The long decline of the sole practice and the traditional partnership, and the shift to incorporated companies, is reshaping the market Law Week covers: consolidation, private equity backed acquisitions and the cost of compliance and insurance all weigh more heavily on the smallest firms. The SRA publishes these figures as headcounts; they do not show why individual firms closed or merged.
Method
Figures are taken from the SRA’s regulated community statistics pages for firms, the solicitor population, firm openings and closures, and the closure breakdown, as published on 15 September 2026. The SRA does not publish these tables by region. Percentage changes are calculated by Law Week.