York city centre spend holds up against the UK high street

York city centre recorded more than 31 million visits between January and November 2025, according to York BID. Card spend returned to growth in June 2026 against a falling national benchmark, and the city's shop vacancy rate remains less than half the national figure.

The picture is not uniformly positive. Year to date to June 2026, York card sales are down 3.4%. Measured against the wider UK high street, however, York is holding up better on sales, spend per customer and vacancy.

Visits

The 31 million figure covers January to November 2025, the most recent period published on that basis, and equates to more than 92,800 visits a day.

The wider visitor economy continues to grow. The 2025 STEAM report, published by Make It York in August 2026, records 8.88 million visitors, of whom 1.87 million stayed overnight, an increase of 9% on 2024. The visitor economy was worth £2.08 billion, up 3.6%, and supports 15,900 full-time equivalent jobs.

Spend against the national benchmark

Beauclair card data, published by York BID, measures York against the median performance of city centre retail areas across the UK's Primary Urban Areas.

In June 2026, York card sales rose 3.1% year on year against a fall of 4.5% in the UK benchmark, an outperformance of 7.6 percentage points. Average revenue per customer rose 6.3% to £84.20, against 2.2% nationally.

Year to date to June 2026, York sales are down 3.4% against a benchmark fall of 4.0%. Customer numbers are down 5.0% over the same period, so the relative strength is coming from spend per customer, which is up 1.7% against 0.6% nationally.

How York compares with other cities

Centre for Cities analyses card transaction and mobile data across the UK's 63 largest city and town centres on a single methodology. On its figures, York ranks second of the 63 for the share of city centre spend coming from overnight visitors, at 12.2%.

Visitors account for 40% of all spending in York city centre. Centre for Cities identifies York as the only UK city where visitor spend exceeds spend by local residents.

Vacancy

York city centre shop vacancy stood at 6.1% in June 2026, according to City of York Council data. The most recent national figure is Savills' estimate of 13.5% at the end of Q3 2025.

York's rate reached a low of 5.3% in January 2026 and has moved within a narrow band since, rising 0.4 percentage points in June.

What it means for the principal pitches

All of these figures are city centre wide. No footfall or spend data is published for individual streets, and none of the above should be read as a measurement of a single pitch.

We read the data as support for York's principal retail streets, where occupier demand has held through a difficult national market. Recent lettings to Space NK and Federal at St Martins Yard on Coney Street are consistent with that view.

Max Reeves, development director at Helmsley Group, said: "York is not immune to what is happening on the national high street, and the first half of this year was difficult for fashion in particular.

"What the data shows is a city centre holding its spend better than the benchmark, with vacancy at less than half the national rate. Visitor spending is making the difference. York draws a larger share of its trade from visitors than any other UK city, and that gives the centre a second source of demand that most regional high streets do not have.

"There is a downside to over-reliance on visitor spend. Locals are the ones who come back on a wet Tuesday in February, so the city cannot take its residents for granted."

Sources: York BID City Centre Insights Reports (BT Active Intelligence and Beauclair data), 2025 and 2026; 2025 STEAM report, Global Tourism Solutions (UK) Ltd, published by Make It York, August 2026; City of York Council / York Open Data; Savills, Shopping Centre and High Street Report, Q3 2025; Centre for Cities, "Spending Time", November 2024, and "Checking Out", July 2025.

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