State of the Sector 2026 ======================== **Key Scottish voluntary sector figures and trends** Key financial trends in 2026 ---------------------------- #### **2026 Overview: The sector continues to grow financially, but resources are not keeping pace** * **Over the past decade, the Scottish charity sector’s income and expenditure have risen by nearly 80%, increasing from just over £5bn in 2015 to just under £10bn in 2025.** * **However, this picture of strong growth is somewhat illusory**. * **Almost half of the increase in income and spending reflects the need to keep pace with inflation. Much of the remainder is driven by rising costs—particularly in areas such as staffing, insurance, and utilities.** * **The number of organisations has grown only slightly over the last decade, albeit with some minor shifts in the sector’s composition. More critically, the paid workforce has increased by just a few thousand (around 10%) over the same period, while the number of volunteers has declined slightly.** * **Taken together, this suggests that, despite strong financial growth, the sector is facing high levels of demand without a corresponding increase in capacity.** **Next steps: over summer 2026, we will examine income and spending patterns to better understand the drivers behind rising expenditure and the growing number of organisations ending the year in deficit.** \- ### Income and Expenditure **The Scottish charity sector's income in 2025 was £9.5bn in 2025.** The sector's income increased in cash terms by £550m between 2024 and 2025**.** However, once we adjust for inflation, real term growth was only around £250m. ![Figure 1. Scottish third sector income 2015 to 2024, with and without inflation adjustment (Line chart)](https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/xWlkT/full.png) \- While the sector's income has grown over the last decade, expenditure has grown even more, closing the gap between between income and spending. Rising costs have been a key driver behind the rise in expenditure, for example: inflation, rising staff costs including increased Employer National Insurance Contributions (ENICs), rising energy bills etc (see the [**Scottish Third Sector Tracker**](https://scvo.scot/research/scottish-third-sector-tracker) and [**Rising Costs paper**](https://scvo.scot/research/reports/the-voluntary-sector-and-rising-costs-a-summary-of-current-voluntary-sector-experiences)). ![Income and Expenditure, 2015 to 2025 (Line chart)](https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/v4kfN/full.png) \- ### Surpluses and deficits **44% of Scottish charities spent more than their income in 2025**. We have seen a rise in the number of charities spending more than their income in recent years . This includes an increase in the number of Medium and Large charities in deficit. ![% of orgs reporting a Deficit, by year and income band (Line chart)](https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/hQRaj/full.png) \- ### Number of organisations **There were over 46,500+ voluntary organisations active in Scotland in 2026.** This figure has remained pretty much unchanged for the last decade, although we have seen some minor shifts within that number, e.g. a growth in CICs (Community Interest Companies) and some evidence of a slight increase in the proportion of groups becoming more formalised and registering as charities, particularly as SCIOs (Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisations). ### Paid staff and volunteers **Scotland’s voluntary sector employs over 136,000 people - 5% of the Scottish workforce.** * The paid workforce has increased by just a few thousand (around 10%) over the last decade. * The number of paid staff has remained flat for the last 5 years, despite income and expenditure increasing by over £2.5bn since 2020. The number of volunteers has seen more volatility, with a steep drop following Covid compounded by the cost-of-living crisis. The number of formal volunteers fell below 1 million in 2022 to 2023. Volunteering has now made a welcome recovery, giving cause for cautious optimism, but numbers remain slightly below 2015 level See [**Volunteer Scotland's analysis**](https://www.volunteerscotland.net/research-evaluation) for more on volunteering. \- ### Next steps Over summer 2026, we will analyse hundreds of charity accounts to identify where these large increases in income are coming from, i.e. funding sources and destinations. We will also examine spending patterns to better understand the drivers behind rising expenditure and the growing number of organisations ending the year in deficit. The voluntary sector in numbers – key facts ------------------------------------------- ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-1.png) There are over 46,500 ------ voluntary sector organisations in Scotland ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-2.png) In a typical year, 4 in 5 ------ households use a voluntary sector service ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-4.png) Almost 1 in 3 ------ people said they had used a services by a charity in the last 12 months (OSCR 2022) ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-5.png) 43% --- of young people said they had used a service provided by a charity in the last 12 months (OSCR 2022) ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-6.png) In 2025 the voluntary sector’s turnover in Scotland was £11.2 bn ----------- Scottish charities **£9.5bn** ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-7.png) In 2025 the voluntary sector spent £11.1 bn -------- on carrying out its activities ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-8.png) In Scotland last year over 1 million -------------- people volunteered ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-9.png) The sector looks after substantial assets on behalf of the communities and people of Scotland… from historic buildings, social housing and community land to investments held by charitable foundations, totalling an estimated £37bn ----- last year ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-10.png) There are over 200,000 ------- trustees leading charities across the country ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-11.png) Scotland’s voluntary sector has 136,000 ------- paid staff ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-12.png) 88% --- of voluntary organisations in Scotland are local ![](https://files.scvo.scot/2024/03/scvo-webdev-aboutthesector-facts-13.png) The voluntary sector plays a particularly important role in rural communities – with 34% --- of organisations based in rural or remote areas **The sector is made up of, among other things:** * **23,800** registered charities including 163 housing associations * Around **1,000** community interest companies * **83** credit unions * Over **6,000** of these voluntary organisations are also social enterprises **[Learn more](http://scvo.scot/research)** about the sector’s size and shape and get in touch with our research team if you'd like to know more. --- ## About SCVO SCVO (Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations) is the national membership organisation for Scotland's voluntary sector. Our role is to champion the role of voluntary organisations in Scotland and to support them to do work that has a positive impact. SCVO supports members and the wider voluntary sector with all aspects of setting up and running a voluntary organisation. SCVO represents the needs and concerns of the voluntary sector to the Scottish government in Holyrood and UK government and Westminster. Through our learning and events programme SCVO offers training and development opportunities to the sector. Members access an extensive membership benefits package including specialist, in-depth, 1-to-1 guidance from our Information Services team and from professional service partners. Access to exclusive membership networks (including comms, employers, governance and policy) supports members to grow their connections, stay up to date, exchange ideas and views with peers, and learn through tailored, learning opportunities. SCVO members enjoy free access to Funding Scotland Premium to stay on top of funding opportunities to support their organisation’s financial resilience. Discounts and savings savings on SCVO products and services (including our HR service, managed IT support, payroll service and events and training) and partner offers provide members with support to allow them to focus on delivering their organisation’s goals. Further SCVO products and services include [extensive digital support](https://scvo.scot/support/digital), a climate action resource [Growing Climate Confidence](https://climateconfident.scot), a voluntary sector publication [Third Force News](https://tfn.scot) and a voluntary sector jobs and recruitment service [Goodmoves](https://goodmoves.org). For more information on SCVO membership, visit [SCVO membership](https://scvo.scot/membership)