RPI inflation, 2022 to August 2026
£1,000 in 2022 is £1,239 today
That £1,000 bought 244 pints of lager in 2022. Today it buys 192.
Prices up 24%4.8% a year on averageMultiply by 1.24
What £1,000 buys
Official average shop prices, not a basket. Things marked as outrunning inflation got dearer faster than everything else; things that lagged got relatively cheaper.
| Item | 2022 | Today |
|---|---|---|
| pints of lager£4.10 then, about £5.20 today | 244 | 192 |
| first-class stampsoutran inflation95p then, £1.80 today | 1,053 | 556 |
| litres of unleadedlagged inflation£1.65 then, about £1.48 today | 606 | 678 |
| packs of 20 cigarettes£12.61 then, about £17.87 today | 79 | 56 |
| nips of whisky£3.12 then, about £4.20 today | 321 | 238 |
| pints of bitter£3.49 then, about £4.09 today | 287 | 244 |
| boxes of tea bags£2.18 then, about £2.84 today | 459 | 352 |
| kg of rump steak£16.97 then, about £20.33 today | 59 | 49 |
| kg of roasting chicken£3.20 then, about £4.07 today | 313 | 246 |
| kg of bananas90p then, about £1.10 today | 1,111 | 911 |
| pints of milk57p then, about 70p today | 1,748 | 1,429 |
| sliced white loaves£1.23 then, about £1.51 today | 813 | 664 |
| Same money, adjusted for inflation | £1,000 | £1,239 |
The ONS stopped publishing these average prices in January 2025. Today's figures are that last reading moved on with inflation, so treat them as close rather than exact.
Houses and wages
Inflation is one story. What people earned, and what a home cost, are the other two.
Average house
£267,388 → £278,784
Up 1.0×, against 1.2× for prices generally
Average pay
£32,032 → £39,312
A year's average earnings, up 1.2×
Years of pay for a house
8.3 → 7.1
Average house price divided by average annual pay
If it had tracked wages
£1,227
What £1,000 in 2022 would be today if it had grown with pay rather than prices