What does the pledge mean? 

On 25 February 2025 the then-Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer announced the UK will spend 2.5% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on defence from 2027.

He told MPs: “We will deliver our commitment to spend 2.5% of GDP on defence, but we will bring it forward so that we reach that level in 2027 and we will maintain that for the rest of this Parliament.”

‘Defence spending’ in this context is broader than just the annual budget of the Ministry of Defence (MOD). The government previously told Full Fact that it refers to all defence spending that falls within the definition of NATO-qualifying spend. This includes some things outside the MOD’s budget, such as armed forces pensions and the Integrated Security Fund, a fund for projects that aim to help tackle threats to the UK’s national security.

NATO members first agreed in 2006 to spend 2% of their GDP on NATO-qualifying defence, then reaffirmed this commitment in 2014. The UK has met this target consistently, and has exceeded it in recent years.

In April 2024, the then-Conservative government committed to spending 2.5% of GDP on defence by 2030, and Labour’s 2024 election manifesto included a commitment to “set out the path” to reaching 2.5%.

The government also said it would update the definition of defence spending “to recognise what our security and intelligence agencies do to boost our security”, and that this will mean that total defence spending from 2027 will be 2.6%.

It later said the Single Intelligence Account budget would not be added to the MOD’s budget, but would be considered “fully NATO qualifying defence spending”, and this was “in line with our allies”.

It’s worth noting others have criticised this decision, labelling it “creative accounting”, and that Labour itself criticised a decision made a decade ago to include intelligence gathering in the spending definition.

What progress has been made?

We’re rating this pledge as ‘appears on track’ because the latest NATO figures estimate the UK is spending approximately 2.56% of its GDP on NATO-qualifying core defence in 2026/27.

This is up from an estimated 2.32% in 2025.

Sometimes budgets and spending can change over the course of a financial year. Each annual NATO release lists the current and previous year as estimates, which may be revised, so this data won’t definitively tell us if the 2.5% target has been achieved until 2028.

The Ministry of Defence confirmed to Full Fact that its figures for 2026/27 include spending relating to the security and intelligence services.

Previously, the government said the increase in NATO-qualifying spend would be funded by a reduction in Official Development Assistance (ODA, also known as the overseas aid budget), from 0.5% of Gross National Income (GNI) to 0.3%.

In 2025, NATO members agreed to spend at least 3.5% of GDP on NATO’s core defence requirements. On 20 July 2026, in his first speech as Prime Minister, Andy Burnham said he would honour the government’s “commitments on defence to our international partners”.