Every UK employer with 250 or more employees is legally required to report their gender pay gap — but a figure in isolation tells you very little. Is 12% high for your sector? Typical for your size? The benchmark tool below compares your mean and median pay gap against official data from more than 10,800 UK employers, filtered by industry sector and organisation size, so you can see exactly where you stand.

What the Benchmark Tool Shows You

• Your percentile ranking within your sector — e.g. better than 68% of employers in Financial Services
• How your mean and median pay gap compare to the sector distribution
• A breakdown of median gaps by employer size band within your industry

Whether your gap is in the bottom third, middle, or top third for your sector

What is a Typical Gender Pay Gap in the UK – and How Does it Vary by Sector?

The UK mean gender pay gap across all employers reporting in 2024–25 is around 12%, with a median of approximately 11%. But sector-level variation is significant:

• Financial & Insurance Services: median gap typically above 20%
• Education: median gap typically 8–12%
• Health & Social Work: median gap typically 5–10%
• Manufacturing: median gap typically 12–18%
• Hospitality & Food Services: median gap can be close to zero or negative in some size bands

Organisation size also matters — larger employers tend to have higher mean gaps due to more pronounced senior leadership skew. The benchmark tool lets you filter by both sector and size band so your comparison is meaningful, not just indicative.

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How the Gender Pay Gap Benchmark Tool Works

The tool is built on the full latest dataset published by the UK Government Gender Pay Gap Service – the same data your organisation submitted to. We pre-calculate percentile distributions for each sector and size band, so results are instant and based on real reported figures, not estimates or surveys.

Enter either or both of:

• Mean gender pay gap %
• Median gender pay gap % (recommended — less affected by extreme values)

If your pay gap favours women, enter the figure as a negative number (e.g. -3.2).

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Why Benchmarking Your Gender Pay Gap Matters

Reporting your gender pay gap is a legal requirement — but the narrative you publish alongside it is where benchmarking becomes essential. Stakeholders, investors, and employees increasingly expect employers to contextualise their figures, not just state them.

Benchmarking helps you:

• Understand whether your gap reflects a genuine structural issue or is typical for your sector
• Provide credible context in your gender pay gap narrative statement
• Brief HR leadership and boards with accurate sector comparisons
• Identify whether the gap warrants action — and what kind

Note: a gender pay gap is not the same as unequal pay. Benchmarking helps clarify which issue, if either, your organisation may be facing.

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What Drives the Gender Pay Gap?

A gender pay gap does not necessarily mean women are paid less for the same work. In most organisations, the gap reflects differences in workforce structure rather than direct pay discrimination. Common drivers include:

1. Underrepresentation of women in senior roles — organisations with fewer women in leadership tend to have higher pay gaps, because senior roles attract higher pay.
2. Pay equity issues — differences in base pay for comparable roles can contribute to the gap and may indicate equal pay risk.
3. Bonus and variable pay — men receive bonuses more frequently in many sectors, and at higher values, which widens the mean gap in particular.
4. Part-time and flexible working patterns — a higher proportion of women in part-time roles affects hourly pay distributions.
5. Occupational segregation — concentration of women in lower-paid functions or job families within an organisation.

Understanding which of these applies to your organisation is the starting point for any meaningful action — and for writing a credible narrative statement.

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How to Reduce Your Gender Pay Gap

If your benchmark results suggest your gap is higher than typical for your sector and size, the next step is diagnosing the cause. Common actions that have measurable impact include:

• Conducting a pay equity audit to identify and address like-for-like pay differences
• Reviewing hiring and promotion data for gender patterns at key pipeline stages
• Improving access to senior roles through structured sponsorship, mentoring, or returnship programmes
• Reviewing bonus and variable pay policies for structural bias
• Setting transparent, time-bound targets and reporting progress annually

Most organisations find that sustained improvement requires structural change over several years, not one-off initiatives.

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From Benchmarking to your Gender Pay Gap Report

Once you have your benchmark context, the next step is producing a compliant gender pay gap report with a narrative that accurately reflects your position. Our Gender Pay Gap Report Toolkit includes:

• Guidance on writing your narrative statement, including how to reference benchmark data
• The statutory GPG Calculator — an Excel template that calculates all six required figures automatically
• A Data Preparation Checklist to ensure your payroll data is correctly structured before you calculate

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Frequently Asked Questions About the Gender Pay Gap

What is a good gender pay gap percentage in the UK?
There is no universally ‘good’ number, but context matters. The UK median gender pay gap across all reporting employers in 2024–25 is around 11%. A gap below 5% is generally considered low; above 20% is high. What matters most is how your figure compares to similar organisations in your sector and size band — which is what this tool shows you.

What is the average gender pay gap in the UK by sector?
Sector variation is significant. Financial services and professional services tend to have the highest gaps (often 20%+), while health, social care, and hospitality typically show lower or near-zero gaps. The benchmark tool shows you the median and mean for your specific sector, drawn from the full 2024–25 government dataset.

Should I use mean or median gender pay gap for benchmarking?
The median pay gap is generally the better figure for benchmarking, as it is less distorted by very high or very low earners at the extremes. The mean is useful for understanding the full spread of pay across the workforce, particularly the impact of senior pay. We recommend entering both where possible.

Can a gender pay gap be negative?
Yes. A negative gender pay gap means women earn more than men on average within that organisation. This is relatively uncommon but does occur — particularly in some healthcare, education, and retail sub-sectors. Enter your figure as a negative number if this applies to you.

Is the gender pay gap the same as unequal pay?
No — these are distinct issues. The gender pay gap measures the difference in average earnings between men and women across an entire organisation, regardless of role. Unequal pay refers to men and women being paid differently for the same or equivalent work, which is unlawful under the Equality Act 2010. A large pay gap may indicate an equal pay risk, but the two are not the same thing.

Who is required to report a gender pay gap in the UK?
UK employers with 250 or more employees are legally required to report their gender pay gap annually under the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017. The deadline for private and voluntary sector employers is 4 April each year; public sector employers must report by 30 March.

Where does the benchmark data come from?
The benchmark data is sourced from the UK Government Gender Pay Gap Service – the official reporting portal where all qualifying employers submit their annual figures.