Government · UK · Office for National Statistics
UK Advertising Output Up 3.4% in Three Months to July
ONS figures for July 2026 show UK advertising and market research output up 3.4% over three months, and computer programming and consultancy up 4.4%. Consumer-facing services went the other way, falling 0.4% in the month.
Source published Summarised
Key findings at a glance
- 3.4% growth in advertising and market research output in the three months to July 2026, against the three months to April
- 4.4% growth in computer programming, consultancy and related activities over the same three months
- 3.5% growth in computer programming, consultancy and related activities in the single month of July 2026
- 2.5% growth in information and communication output in the three months to July 2026
- 2.1% growth in professional, scientific and technical activities in the three months to July 2026
- 1.7% growth in services output compared with the same three months a year earlier
- 0.4% monthly real GDP growth in July 2026, following growth of 0.3% in June
- 1.6% how much higher real GDP was in July 2026 than in July 2025
- 0.5% fall in wholesale and retail trade output in the three months to July 2026, driven by a 3.0% fall in wholesale trade
- 0.4% fall in consumer-facing services output in July 2026, after growth of 0.4% in June
- 1.4% fall in food and beverage service activities in the three months to July 2026
- 29% of trading businesses named economic uncertainty as the main challenge affecting turnover in August 2026
What the report covers
The Office for National Statistics published its monthly gross domestic product estimate for July 2026 on 11 September 2026. It measures real gross value added across the UK economy, split into 14 services subsectors alongside production and construction, and reports both a single-month movement and the steadier three-month on three-month comparison. Real GDP grew 0.4% in July and 0.4% across the three months to July against the three months to April, the eighth consecutive three-month rise.
The sector detail is where this release earns attention from anyone selling marketing or technology services. Professional, scientific and technical activities grew 2.1% over the three months, with advertising and market research up 3.4% inside it. Information and communication grew 2.5%, driven by a 4.4% rise in computer programming, consultancy and related activities. The ONS adds a useful note of its own: many of the businesses reporting the largest July turnover across computer programming and information services are working on artificial intelligence and cloud computing, though its survey returns cannot separate that activity out precisely.
The consumer side moved the other way. Wholesale and retail trade fell 0.5% over the three months, the largest negative contribution to services, driven by a 3.0% fall in wholesale trade. Retail trade on its own grew 1.4% across those three months but fell 0.5% in July itself, and consumer-facing services as a whole fell 0.4% in the month after growing in May and June. That is the same softening we covered in our report on UK online retail share in July 2026.
What this means for UK marketers
Two economies show up in this release and they sell to each other. The sectors that supply marketing, research and software grew through the summer. The sectors that sell to consumers did not.
For agencies and B2B service businesses, the 3.4% rise in advertising and market research output is the clearest signal here. It follows the 4.3% rise for the April to June quarter covered in our earlier report on advertising and market research output, so this is a second consecutive period of growth rather than a one-month bounce. Marketing budgets are not being cut across the board. What has shifted is where they sit: growth is concentrated in professional and technology sectors, not in retail and hospitality. If your pipeline leans on consumer-facing clients, plan for longer decisions and tighter budgets. If it leans on B2B technology, professional services or anything adjacent to AI and cloud, the demand signal is real.
The 4.4% three-month rise in computer programming and consultancy, and the ONS observation about AI and cloud work sitting behind much of the largest July turnover, has a practical read for anyone doing digital marketing for UK technology firms. Those firms are growing and buying. They are also crowded, because every one of them is running the same AI positioning. The less contested ground is search demand around implementation, integration and governance, not the category term itself.
Ecommerce and retail operators should read the divergence more carefully than the headline allows. Retail trade grew 1.4% over the three months but fell 0.5% in July, and food and beverage service activities fell 1.4% across the quarter. That is a consumer trading down inside a flat market, not a collapse. For ecommerce operators the implication is margin discipline: acquisition costs are unlikely to ease while the sector is flat, so the return sits in conversion rate, retention and average order value rather than in buying more traffic.
One caveat to hold onto. Economic uncertainty was still the most common challenge businesses reported as affecting turnover in August 2026, named by 29% of trading businesses in the ONS Business Insights and Conditions Survey. Sector growth and business confidence are not moving in step.
How they got the data
Monthly GDP is an output-based estimate built mainly from the ONS Monthly Business Survey, which covers 43.3% of the services sector by industry weight. The turnover response rate for the services element was 84.6% in July 2026. That is below the 97.9% the ONS eventually reached for 2025, but it is normal at this point in the reporting cycle, because late returns are folded into subsequent releases. Construction returns came in at 80.0%. Industries are classified under the UK Standard Industrial Classification, and the series is seasonally adjusted with X-13-ARIMA-SEATS, applied at industry level then aggregated upwards. These are accredited official statistics, independently reviewed by the Office for Statistics Regulation.
Two limitations matter when quoting these figures. Monthly growth rates are volatile, and the ONS advises reading them alongside the three-month rate rather than on their own. And because intermediate consumption is only collected annually, monthly gross value added is proxied from deflated turnover, which is why early estimates revise. The whole time series reopens for revision on 15 October 2026 when Blue Book 2026 improvements land. Full detail is in the ONS quality and methodology information for GDP.
Government · UK
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From Office for National Statistics · published 11/09/2026