MigrationWatchdog

Asylum hotels: how many, where, what they cost

Contingency hotel accommodation is the most contested part of the asylum support system. This page brings together every official figure on it that exists.

16,021 asylum seekers were in contingency hotels in the UK as at 30 Jun 2026 — 17.2% of all those in Home Office accommodation — down from a peak of 56,018 in 30 Sep 2023, spread across 101 local authorities.

What is not published — and what this page will not invent
The Home Office does not publish the names, addresses or locations of asylum hotels, and this site will not construct such a list: the only official geography is the local-authority count below. Hotels are a subset of contingency accommodation, which itself sits alongside dispersal and initial accommodation — the figures here count hotel places only. Counts are point-in-time snapshots by the local authority of a person's registered address; sites open and close between quarters.
16,021
in contingency hotels
as at 30 Jun 2026 · source
17.2%
of all supported accommodation
as at 30 Jun 2026 · source
101
local authorities with hotel places
as at 30 Jun 2026 · source
£3.1bn
hotel cost, FY 2023-24
FY 2023-24 · source

The hotel population over time

The series peaked at 56,018 people in 30 Sep 2023 and stands at 16,021 (as at 30 Jun 2026).

56k031 Mar 201430 Jun 202631 Mar 2014 — 030 Jun 2014 — 030 Sep 2014 — 031 Dec 2014 — 031 Mar 2015 — 030 Jun 2015 — 030 Sep 2015 — 031 Dec 2015 — 031 Mar 2016 — 030 Jun 2016 — 030 Sep 2016 — 031 Dec 2016 — 031 Mar 2017 — 030 Jun 2017 — 030 Sep 2017 — 031 Dec 2017 — 031 Mar 2018 — 030 Jun 2018 — 030 Sep 2018 — 031 Dec 2018 — 031 Mar 2019 — 030 Jun 2019 — 030 Sep 2019 — 031 Dec 2019 — 031 Mar 2020 — 030 Jun 2020 — 030 Sep 2020 — 031 Dec 2020 — 031 Mar 2021 — 030 Jun 2021 — 030 Sep 2021 — 031 Dec 2021 — 031 Mar 2022 — 030 Jun 2022 — 030 Sep 2022 — 031 Dec 2022 — 45,75331 Mar 2023 — 47,49030 Jun 2023 — 50,52030 Sep 2023 — 56,01831 Dec 2023 — 45,74431 Mar 2024 — 34,48630 Jun 2024 — 29,56130 Sep 2024 — 35,62831 Dec 2024 — 38,05431 Mar 2025 — 32,32630 Jun 2025 — 32,04130 Sep 2025 — 36,27331 Dec 2025 — 30,65731 Mar 2026 — 20,88530 Jun 2026 — 16,021
People in Home Office contingency hotel accommodation, quarterly snapshots. Asylum seekers in receipt of support by local authority, year ending June 2026 (Home Office).
31 Mar 2014 to 30 Jun 2026 · source

What hotels cost

The National Audit Office put hotel accommodation at £3.1bn in FY 2023-24, within total asylum support spending of £4.7bn — and found hotels accounted for 76% of the cost of the accommodation contracts while housing a far smaller share of the people in them.

“People accommodated in hotels account for around 35% of all people in asylum accommodation and for around 76% of the cost of the contracts (£1.3 billion out of an estimated £1.7 billion in the first seven months of 2024-25).”
first seven months of FY 2024-25 · source

The full cost picture, including written-off hotel losses →

Where hotel places are recorded

The 101 local authorities with recorded contingency hotel places, largest first. These figures sum to 16,021 — the same national total as the headline figure above, from the same release. Each authority links to its own page.

Local authorities with recorded contingency hotel places
Local authorityNationIn hotelsAll supported
HillingdonEngland9651,188
HounslowEngland9241,139
ManchesterEngland7081,509
BirminghamEngland5892,136
CroydonEngland5571,008
NewhamEngland541866
StockportEngland485664
RugbyEngland433567
BrentEngland427789
BarnetEngland382878
YorkEngland360366
Windsor and MaidenheadEngland347368
Mid SussexEngland321326
Bristol, City ofEngland318689
CrawleyEngland290301
SouthwarkEngland280496
West NorthamptonshireEngland271478
HackneyEngland266373
WarwickEngland262380
StevenageEngland217267
ReadingEngland211523
LeedsEngland2091,365
LiverpoolEngland2081,961
LambethEngland206285
SloughEngland201318
Bournemouth, Christchurch and PooleEngland200333
Hammersmith and FulhamEngland200225
Kensington and ChelseaEngland179180
BradfordEngland1571,097
South RibbleEngland151385
LeicesterEngland1451,333
CamdenEngland141168
DerbyEngland1401,127
OxfordEngland140184
Antrim and NewtownabbeyNorthern Ireland138199
Newcastle upon TyneEngland136915
SheffieldEngland1321,034
EalingEngland1301,073
WarringtonEngland127397
Causeway Coast and GlensNorthern Ireland127206
as at 30 Jun 2026 · source

Showing the 40 largest of 101. Every authority, sortable → · download the full table →

What the statistics regulator has said about these figures

The Office for Statistics Regulation is the independent regulator of official statistics. Its correspondence with the Home Office about the asylum hotel series is published in full; the openings are quoted below and each links to the whole letter. These are the regulator's judgements about how the figures are produced and released — not statistics, and not this site's own findings.

  1. Ed Humpherson to John Wilkins: Asylum Seeker Hotel Population Statistics

    8 May 2026

    “Dear John, Thank you for your letter informing me of the unscheduled release of an internal Home Office figure that appears similar to an upcoming official statistic from the Asylum Seeker Hotel Population Statistics series. I agree with your view that this is a breach of the Code of Practice for Statistics. I note your reasons for deciding not to produce an ad-hoc release for the figure in line with published guidance on the use…”

  2. John Wilkins to Ed Humpherson: Asylum Seeker Hotel Population Statistics

    30 April 2026

    “Dear Ed, I am writing to inform you that I have become aware of the unscheduled release of an internal Home Office figure that appears similar to an upcoming official statistic from our Asylum Seeker Hotel Population Statistics series. Despite not being released publicly through formal channels, a figure for the number of asylum seekers…”

published up to 2026-05-08 · Office for Statistics Regulation correspondence

Download this data

Every file carries provenance headers. All datasets →

Ministers make claims about hotel numbers and hotel closures in Parliament. Read them beside these figures → — quoted verbatim, with the period of both, and no verdict from this site.

Data as of

Cite this page

Asylum hotels: how many, where, what they cost. Migration Watchdog, data as of 2026-09-03.
https://migrationwatchdog.com/hotels
Underlying figures: UK official statistics, re-published under OGL v3.0 — every figure links to its source on the page.

Sources for this page