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Ministry of Justice · Criminal court statistics quarterly

Magistrates' court open cases

2026 Q1 Final

370,722cases

Magistrates' court open cases were 370,722 cases at 31 March 2026, up 11.3% (37,528) from 333,194 at 31 March 2025.

▲ 11.3% · +37,528 against 2025 Q1 (same quarter previous year)

  1. Ministry of Justice snapshot
  2. 2026 Q1
  3. published 25 June 2026
  4. Table M1
  5. row “2026 Q1”
  6. column “All cases: Open”
  7. cell value 370722

2026 Q1 is the highest figure in the published series: 370,722. Rule: highest of the 29 periods published here (2019 Q1 to 2026 Q1).

2019 Q1 to 2026 Q1

Magistrates' court open cases: 2019 Q1 to 2026 Q1ConservativeConservativeConservativeLabourLabour0100k200k300k20202022202420262019 Q1: 222,176 cases · published 25 June 20262019 Q2: 219,963 cases · published 25 June 20262019 Q3: 214,907 cases · published 25 June 20262019 Q4: 223,533 cases · published 25 June 20262020 Q1: 250,500 cases · published 25 June 20262020 Q2: 345,284 cases · published 25 June 20262020 Q3: 331,806 cases · published 25 June 20262020 Q4: 302,355 cases · published 25 June 20262021 Q1: 309,595 cases · published 25 June 20262021 Q2: 277,491 cases · published 25 June 20262021 Q3: 262,047 cases · published 25 June 20262021 Q4: 273,246 cases · published 25 June 20262022 Q1: 259,674 cases · published 25 June 20262022 Q2: 249,404 cases · published 25 June 20262022 Q3: 265,773 cases · published 25 June 20262022 Q4: 260,843 cases · published 25 June 20262023 Q1: 252,887 cases · published 25 June 20262023 Q2: 254,061 cases · published 25 June 20262023 Q3: 259,138 cases · published 25 June 20262023 Q4: 278,367 cases · published 25 June 20262024 Q1: 282,125 cases · published 25 June 20262024 Q2: 291,161 cases · published 25 June 20262024 Q3: 321,717 cases · published 25 June 20262024 Q4: 327,236 cases · published 25 June 20262025 Q1: 333,194 cases · published 25 June 20262025 Q2: 347,193 cases · published 25 June 20262025 Q3: 359,306 cases · published 25 June 20262025 Q4: 364,779 cases · published 25 June 20262026 Q1: 370,722 cases · published 25 June 2026
Published valueProvisional or revisedLatestShaded bands: governments (see labels)Hover or use arrow keys to read a value

What this measures

The number of criminal cases open at magistrates' courts in England and Wales at the end of the quarter, a snapshot of live cases on the Libra case-management system.

What this doesn’t measure

Cases waiting at the Crown Court, how long individual cases have been open, or cases in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Important caveat

Open cases at magistrates' courts are a snapshot of live cases on the Libra case-management system at the end of the quarter, not a calculation from receipts and disposals. The Ministry of Justice notes that the volumes can be influenced by the transfer of cases, changes to offences and cases or offences entered in error, that data may change when refreshed after validation, and that the series is only available from 2019. A technical issue in September 2020 omitted a small number (under 1 per cent) of disposals from the Q3 2020 totals.

Revision history

No period of this series has been revised since it was first ingested here. Revisions are recorded automatically when a later release publishes a different figure for the same period.

Source

Publisher
Ministry of Justice
Publication
Criminal court statistics quarterly
Release
January to March 2026, published 25 June 2026
Source file
ccsq_2026Q1.ods
File SHA-256
b6823b9b68923d7039050194eb303b8fc1a1071f5f6a555585d15cf21146dd40
Retrieved
2 September 2026
Sheet
Table_M1
Table
Table M1
Row
2026 Q1
Column
All cases: Open
Cell value
370722
Geography
England and Wales
Unit
cases
API
/api/metrics/magistrates_open_cases · /series · /vintages

Government periods

Change during each government, from the level inherited to the last complete period before it left office. Describes the period; does not attribute cause.

Labour 2024–291,1612024 Q2370,7222026 Q1↑ 27.3%
Conservative 2019–2024214,9072019 Q3291,1612024 Q2↑ 35.5%

Full comparison with chart

Release
January to March 2026 · publication page
Last updated
25 June 2026
Next release expected
September 2026 (estimated from the usual cadence)