Age of published CQC ratings for older people's care homes in England, by local authority (October 2026)

This dataset shows how long ago the Care Quality Commission (CQC) published the current rating for care homes serving older people in England, summarised for each of 152 local authorities. It covers 10,796 homes and 414,782 beds. The median published rating is 3.7 years old. 3,100 homes (29%), with 103,504 beds, have a rating more than five years old, and 566 homes have no published rating. Rating age is the time since the CQC published the rating, not since an inspector visited. An old rating is not evidence of poor care: the CQC has been operating a reduced inspection programme, some homes are rated service by service, and new homes have not yet been inspected. Source: CQC Care directory with ratings and Care directory with filters, both dated 4 August 2026, with ratings and publication dates re-checked on the CQC website on 23 October 2026. Homes were filtered to the older people service user band with a care home service type, with or without nursing. Dormant locations and 447 duplicate registrations were removed. CQC data © Care Quality Commission, used under the Open Government Licence v3.0. The CQC does not endorse this work. The full method, findings and a home-by-home file are at https://whatcarecosts.co.uk/research/inspection-ages/