NHS waiting times - stage of treatment
Inpatients, day cases and new outpatients

About this release

This monthly release by Public Health Scotland (PHS) focuses on the length of time patients wait to be seen as a new outpatient or admitted for treatment as an inpatient or day case. Revised calculations of wait featured in the 2023 waiting times guidance published by the Scottish Government in December 2023 have been implemented by PHS since July 2025. These latest statistics up to 31 January 2026 cover all patients waiting for an appointment or procedure as well as those seen and removed from a waiting list covered by the national standards. Individual patients are counted more than once if they are waiting to attend more than one scheduled hospital appointment or admission, so the official statistics shown here do not reflect the actual number of individuals involved. To avoid overestimating the population affected, the number of ongoing waits for inpatients, day cases, new outpatients and any other service (e.g. diagnostics) should not be added together to determine the proportion of the total population waiting for these types of care. These statistics are however supplemented with an estimate on the number of individuals waiting.

Infographic of an overview of latest statistics on waiting list activity for NHSScotland from January 2024 to January 2026 for key indicators including attendances/admissions, ongoing waits and waits over 52 weeks for new outpatients and inpatients and day cases

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Overview of latest statistics on waiting list activity, NHSScotland, up to 31 January 2026

Main points

• At 31 January 2026, there were an estimated 586,859 individuals on at least one new outpatient, inpatient or day case waiting list. This is equivalent to around 1 in 9 of Scotland’s population (mid-2024 population estimates Scotland). Within this total, 457,549 individuals were estimated to be waiting for a new outpatient appointment, and 151,609 for an inpatient or day case admission.

New outpatients national standard - 95% of new outpatients should wait no longer than 12 weeks from referral to being seen

• There were 115,595 attendances at a new outpatient clinic during January 2026, with 59.8% of these waits completed in 12 weeks or less, a decrease from 62.1% in December. In 2025/26 to date, there have been 1,116,954 attendances, up 60,020 compared to the same 10 months in 2024/25.
• At 31 January 2026, the number of ongoing waits decreased by 2.5% to 504,949 compared to the end of the previous month and by 10.4% compared to 31 January 2025.
• In line with the timing of the 2023 guidance implementation, statistics on long waits are directly comparable from 31 July 2025 onwards. From then, the number of waits over 52 weeks has reduced month on month, down to 30,259 at 31 January 2026, a decrease of 7,909 compared to the end of December. Of these, 2,752 waits had exceeded two years, down 1,256 from the end of December marking the fourth consecutive monthly decrease.

Treatment Time Guarantee - Following the decision to treat, all eligible patients should wait no longer than 12 weeks for treatment as an inpatient or day case.

• There were 22,887 inpatient and day case admissions during January 2026, with 56.6% completed within 12 weeks of the treatment being agreed, a fall from 58.4% in December. In 2025/26 to date, there have been 226,735 admissions, up 13,409 compared to the same 10 months in 2024/25.
• At 31 January 2026, the number of ongoing waits for treatment was 157,156, down 0.4% from the end of December and 1.5% from 31 January 2025.
• In line with the timing of the 2023 guidance implementation, statistics on long waits are directly comparable from 31 July 2025 onwards. From then, the number of waits over 52 weeks has reduced month on month, down to 23,057 at 31 January 2026, a decrease of 1,814 compared to the end of December. Of these, 3,639 had exceeded two years, a decrease of 620 from the end of December. Waits over two years have also reduced each month since 31 July 2025.

Background

The waiting times section of the website provides further information relating to the supply, quality assurance and reporting of waits, as well as links to the latest national guidance set by the Scottish Government.

Further information

As outlined above, PHS has now increased the frequency of this publication from quarterly to monthly, reflecting high levels of public interest in the statistics. It is the fourth release of waiting times statistics following the implementation of the NHSScotland waiting times guidance, published by Scottish Government in December 2023 and implemented by PHS in July 2025. The statistics are now aligned to the revised waiting time clock adjustment rules, the impact of which is referenced in the report, with further detail available via the PHS impact assessment - 2023 waiting times guidance. This includes analysis using statistics published on 28 October 2025. Updated analysis, covering the period up to 31 March 2026, is scheduled for release on 28 April 2026. Further details to follow.

The next release of this publication will be 31 March 2026.