The report asked 807 organisations questions including their digital communications and fundraising priorities for the next 12 months.

Growing reach, presence and engagement was the top answer (59% of respondents), followed by increasing online fundraising income (51%); using data to better understand and engage with supporters (43%); revamping their website (36%) and developing content to improve visibility in AI search tools (29%).

Larger charities placed a greater emphasis on improving supporter engagement (57%) and improving AI search visibility (45%), while smaller charities generally had a smaller group of priorities, with growing reach and presence still the most common goal overall (60%).

Young supporters: low priority

The report’s authors say that they were “surprised that, once again, growing a young supporter base was only a priority for a small proportion of charities – 25%, similar to 2025 data and identical for both large and small charities”.

This figure rises to 31% among charities identifying children and young people as a core target group, and to 45% of charities led by what it calls “global majority communities” (i.e. with leaders or founders from minoritised ethnic groups).

AI uses

The report also looks at how charities are using AI organisationally, with the top five applications being:

1. Administration and project management: 63% (versus 48% in 2025’s report)
2. Grant fundraising: 45% (2025: 36%), rising to 52% among smaller charities
3. Social media: 39% (2025: 36%)
4. Communications and fundraising: 36% (2025: 34%)
5. Monitoring and evaluation: 31% (2025: 17%)

It flags that 58% of grantmaking organisations responding to the survey say that AI appears to be changing their applications – either increasing the volume of applications, or making them more repetitive.

However, 55% of grantmakers in the report said they weren’t sure how many of their applicants were using AI, and 19% said they thought none were.

Digital capacity lacking

The report expresses concerns about a lack of digital skill in charities’ leadership, saying that 46% of respondents (rising to 49% among smaller charities) do not have a trustee or board member with digital skills.

It also shows that only 22% of small charities and 37% of larger charities accessed funding towards digital costs in the last year. For 2026, 59% say that building skills of staff, volunteers and leaders is a priority, a significant jump from 43% in 2025.

Consultants and co-authors Zoe Amar and Nissa Ramsay write in the report foreword:

“Funders and support organisations must define their roles in supporting charities as AI and digital creates far-reaching changes across their work and society.

“Our data shows that charities are making digital and AI progress despite the huge financial and service demands they are facing. The fact that charities have achieved this growth, when the odds are against them, indicates that charities could increase their impact even further if funders step up to help charities at this critical stage in digital and AI development.”

Beacon informed its customers of the attack on 4 August, which it said started in the early hours of the morning on 27 July. Beacon immediately reported the incident to the Information Commissioner’s Office and the authorities, bringing in expert support to help it conduct an investigation.

While the investigation confirmed that a copy of the database holding all Beacon customer data, including attachment files, was made and likely downloaded in a readable format by the threat actor, it found no evidence that any bank card details had been compromised, or that the data stolen had been “published, disclosed, or otherwise misused”.

The most recent update posted on its website (3 September) concluded the investigation, and said that while the threat actor had not been engaged with, they had contacted Beacon once towards the conclusion of the investigation to indicate they would be deleting any data they have exfiltrated and that no copy would be retained, sold, or shared. Beacon adds that dark web monitoring has found no mention of this incident or data related to it online, and that there is no evidence this was a targeted attack on Beacon, or any specific Beacon customer. Everything learned has been shared with law enforcement.

According to Beacon, the probable root cause of the incident was a compromised AWS access key. These are credentials used to allow the Beacon application to communicate securely with Amazon Web Services, its primary cloud hosting provider. Beacon’s understanding is that this access key was inadvertently exposed in its application code and subsequently used to gain unauthorised access to the organisation’s AWS environment.

The vulnerability that enabled this to happen has since been fixed, and measures implemented to ensure it cannot happen again. These are listed in Beacon’s report, accessible here.

During its investigation, Beacon published an Incident FAQs and Incident Guidance page on its website, providing advice and explanations of the situation and what customers should do next. These also clarified that Beacon was still “operating normally” and that charities could continue to collect payments through it. In a statement to Fundraising Europe on 1 September, Beacon said:

“Since containing the initial incident, we have not identified or observed any ongoing unauthorised access to Beacon’s systems. Our customers continue to access our platform and services as normal.”

Beacon’s website says it is used by more than 1,000 charities. The company is based in London and most client case studies on its website are charities based in the UK, with at least two from the Republic of Ireland.

Reports to regulator & maintaining supporter trust

Following the incident, Beacon and the Charity Commission for England and Wales (CCEW) advised that charities should consider their reporting obligations, such as whether they needed to report the incident to the CCEW, to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) or other regulators. CCEW’s statement also said:

“We know many Beacon customers have moved promptly to inform their supporters about this incident. Clear communication with your charity’s stakeholders is crucial to retaining trust and protecting the relationships that sustain your work.”

 The Fundraising Regulator also said that all charities impacted needed to submit a report through its website.

The CCEW provides guidance on how to report a serious incident and how to protect charities from cyber crime and fraud.

The amount donated by the British public fell in 2025 for the first time in five years, with rising costs continuing to put pressure on public generosity and charity fundraising budgets. In response, the CIOF has partnered with CharityTracker, which surveys a nationally representative sample of 4,000 UK adults every month to provide insight for charities into how people are thinking, feeling and behaving, and how that is changing over time. As part of this monthly survey, respondents will now be asked the following question on behalf of the CIOF: Have you been asked to donate to charity in any of the following ways, in the last 4 weeks?

Participants are asked to select from a list of fundraising approaches, including a range of fundraising channels, workplace giving, and requests from friends and family.

By tracking responses to this question every month, the CIOF wants to establish how often people are being asked to give and through which channels. This will enable trends to be identified over time and a benchmark to be developed, providing its members with insight into what fundraising activity is reaching supporters effectively, where gaps exist, and whether changes or greater investment may be needed. The data will also help inform the CIOF’s wider work on growing giving and championing fundraising.

The initiative supports the pillar ‘Fostering a culture that inspires more people to give’ of the CIOF’s ten-year strategy, which launched in January 2026. A key strand of this work is to challenge the barriers and misconceptions that prevent people from giving and to encourage more to support charitable causes.

Rob Cope, executive director, membership & operations, Chartered Institute of Fundraising, says:

“It’s fantastic to have an organisation like CharityTracker join us as an official partner. We’ll work with them to gauge public awareness and perception of fundraising — using the data they share with us to identify trends in fundraising and any gaps where changes or improvements could be made. It will be a valuable resource for our members, and for informing the future work of our Growing Giving and Championing Fundraising Advisory Panels.”

Anna Turner, head of research & insight at CharityTracker, adds:

“Regular, evidence-based insight is essential to understanding donor behaviour, strengthening supporter relationships and helping charities develop more resilient, effective fundraising strategies. Tracking this question month by month will provide the sector with an invaluable new source of intelligence to inform future fundraising.”

The partnership’s first results have been uploaded to the CIOF website, and reveal that 63% of respondents were asked to donate to charity in August, mainly in-person, such as a street or door-to-door collector (20%), through an ad (20%), or by email (15%).

The report from the Fundraising Regulator also shows that overall public trust in UK charities has fallen since 2023, but donors’ actual experience of supporting charities remains largely positive.

The organisation surveyed 3,018 adults across the UK — including Scotland, which has its own, separate regulator — in May 2026, and compared results with a previous December 2023 poll.

In 2023, 42% of respondents said they trusted local charities to deliver on their promises. This dropped to 34% in 2026, although they remain the second most trusted group (behind health professionals, at 46%).

For national charities, the figure dropped from 32% to 27%. For national government, it is now just 11%.

Fundraising experience: positive overall

However, trust in “people who ask you to donate money or goods to a charity” — which was the exact wording of the question — has remained stable. In both 2023 and 2026, just 16% said they did not trust fundraisers.

In addition, the experience of those who do donate to charities — around 85% of respondents in both 2023 and 2026 — remains largely positive.

In 2026, 23% called it ‘very positive’ and 41% called it ‘somewhat positive’, which are almost identical figures to 2023, although the report notes that the methodology means they are not completely comparable.

In both years, 29% answered ‘equally positive and negative’.

Method by method

The report also looks at peoples’ levels of comfort with different fundraising methods.

The most acceptable fundraising method was donation of goods — 81% of people said they were ‘very’ or ‘fairly’ comfortable, followed by sponsorship of individuals (68%), charity bags (65%) and charitable lotteries (64%).

At the other end, 28% were okay with door-to-door fundraising, 29% with telephone fundraising, 38% with text donations and 43% with tap to donate.

However, since 2023 comfort with online fundraising platforms has decreased from 60% to 52%, whereas it has increased for door-to-door fundraising (from 20% to 28%) and public fundraising (43% to 47%).

The report also shows significant differences between age groups — younger people are much more likely to be comfortable with both door-to-door and public fundraising. Donation of goods is the only category in which those aged 65+ are more comfortable than those aged 16-24.

Many make no checks

Asked what checks they made before making a donation, 32% said they did not make any. This rises to 53% of over-65s, but is lower than 20% for both 16–24s and 25–34s.

Meanwhile, 25% said they would look at the charity’s website, 21% would do some research on the cause area, and 18% would ask friends or family.

A less popular answer is looking for the Fundraising Regulator’s badge at 11%. However, 45% said in response to a separate question that they’d be more likely to donate to a charity displaying this badge.

Elsewhere, the research says that only 17% of respondents remembered seeing the regulator’s Fundraising Badge in the past year, while 47% said they had never heard of the Fundraising Regulator.

Paul Winyard, head of policy at the Fundraising Regulator, says that there are several positive findings for charities, and comments:

“Charities must continue to invest in strong oversight, effective training and responsible fundraising practices so the public can give with confidence and charities can continue to thrive.”

OSCR’s report also looks at the average income and expenditure breakdown of charities with an income of £250,000-plus — the level at which this detail is required by the regulator.

These charities get 63.1% of income from charitable activities (such as delivering contracts or services), 18.1% from trading activities (such as retail, merchandise or admission fees for museums), 13.4% from donations and legacies, and the remaining 5.3% from ‘other’ sources.

Looking at their outgoings, 83% of expenditure is on charitable activities, 7.6% is on raising funds, and 9.4% on ‘other expenditure’.

Cross-border comparison

These figures are broadly in line with the 5% to 12% which Dutch charities spend on raising funds, as highlighted in a Fundraising Europe story in December — although these figures are not directly comparable given differences in how each regulator defines and reports fundraising and overhead costs.

The above figures also relate only to charities registered solely in Scotland. In addition to these 23,640 charities, a further 1,306 ‘cross-border charities’ are registered with OSCR. These are charities also registered with another regulator, generally the Charity Commission for England and Wales (CCEW).

The Scottish charities have an average income of £794,000, while for the cross-border charities it is a far larger £15.2m. This reflects the cross-border charities being generally high-profile organisations operating across the UK and sometimes internationally — and OSCR estimates that roughly a tenth of cross-border charities’ money might be spent in Scotland.

The majority of Scottish charities are far smaller — around seven in ten charities have an income of less than £100,000, and 26% have an income under £5,000. Two-thirds (69%) have no paid staff, and less than a tenth have more than 10 staff.

Nearly half of the £18.76bn total income of Scottish charities is from 18 universities (31.2%) and 149 registered social landlords (14.3%).

Charities per population

Scotland’s population is 5.6m, giving it 4.3 registered charities (excluding cross-border charities) per 1,000 people.

The same 4.3 figure is true of Northern Ireland, with 8,337 charities registered with the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland.

Meanwhile in England and Wales, the figure is much lower at 2.8 per 1,000 population, based on CCEW’s figure of 171,613 charities.

OSCR’s report also looks at the average size of charity boards. Among Scottish charities, the mean average number of trustees is seven, and the median is five. Cross-border charities have both a mean and median of nine trustees, reflecting their generally larger size.

In April, Fundraising Europe reported on separate research into Scotland’s grantmaking foundations, which found they hold almost £4bn (€4.7bn) in net funds.

This is according to the 9th annual Status of UK Fundraising report from fundraising software provider Blackbaud Europe, based on the surveying of 380 UK fundraisers in January 2026.

One in eight (12%) ‘strongly agree’ that they have the knowledge to use AI responsibly and 45% ‘somewhat agree’, while 22% disagree and 21% were undecided. The report also shows that charities are increasingly getting up to speed with AI — in 2024, 68% of respondents said their charity had not begun creating an AI policy. In 2026, the majority (64%) either have one in place, or are currently working on it.

Nonetheless, fundraisers expressed several concerns about using AI in their organisations — most commonly misinformation (81%); inaccurate output (78%); and data security (75%). Less common concerns included job security (17%) and accessibility (9%).

Asked about the challenges their organisation faces in adopting and leveraging AI, the clear leaders were ethical concerns (61%) and lack of AI training (59%). In another sign that organisations want to get on board, relatively few respondents cited budget constraints (30%) and resistance to change (23%).

What resources do you need?

Asked ‘Which of the following resources would help you better leverage AI?’, the top answers were:

• Guidance on ethical and responsible AI usage – 65%
• Case studies of successful AI implementation in the sector – 56%
• Interactive training sessions, led by sector AI thought leaders – 44%
• Sector-specific templates for AI project planning – 42%
• Funding opportunities for AI-related initiatives – 40%
• Technical support for integrating AI with existing systems – 39%

Technology rarely credited for growth

Around two-thirds (63%) of the respondents met or exceeded their fundraising targets in the last full financial year, and 71% saw their voluntary income either grow or hold steady.

When asked what drove that income growth, ‘exceptional gifts’ was cited by 49% — making it the main driver for the fourth year running. It was followed by greater focus on supporter experience (36%), new or different activity (31%) and investment in fundraising (30%), while making the most of technology (9%) and investing in technology (6%) ranked lowest of all the options offered.

The report also includes anonymous responses from fundraisers surveyed. One expressed scepticism around the value of AI:

“Fundraising in our organisation is extremely personalised, with lots of context that only a personable touch and a human relationship can provide. Using AI to predict things or its use in wealth screening takes away the nuance of knowing prior context or relationship.”

Another said that AI was already reshaping grant fundraising:

 “[AI] has dramatically increased the number of applications that can be generated, leading to trusts and foundations becoming overwhelmed and saturated by applications. This has led to a number closing down or restructuring, as they don’t have the capacity to deal with this.”

The donation platform goDonate, which is used by charities including the British Heart Foundation, World Food Programme and YMCA, analysed £30m (around €34.74m) of anonymised transaction data from 2025.

It found that 58% of one-off donations were made on mobile (versus 42% on desktop), which is up from 40% in 2024. For regular donations, the mobile giving figure grew from 61% to 67%.

Desktop gifts remain more valuable, averaging £78.59 (€91) for one-off donations and £15.47 (€18) for regular giving, compared with £43.79 and £8.96 on mobile. Gift values were broadly stable year on year, though one-off mobile donations dipped slightly.

This suggests that goDonate’s clients are faring better than many other UK charities — last month, Fundraising Europe reported that average donations in the country were dropping, with the sector having lost approximately £12.4bn in donor income in the last decade.

Digital wallets ‘reshaping donor behaviour’

The report also highlights the impact of digital wallets, saying that 49% of one-off donations in 2025 used a digital wallet, up from 45% in 2024. PayPal and Apple Pay are used far more often than Google Pay, it notes.

Average one-off card donations were £59.65. Donations via digital wallets were smaller: £38.26 with PayPal, £38.76 with Apple Pay, and £32.71 with Google Pay.

The report says that the findings show that mobile giving is now the ‘default’ option for users. Despite this, it notes, many charities “treat mobile as a simplified version of desktop”, rather than having a website optimised for mobile devices.

GoDonate’s founder and CEO Vicky Reeves comments:

“Charities must design for mobile-first giving and reduce friction during the donor journey. It also means offering digital wallets as part of the wide range of donation options supporters expect.”

The report includes a five-point checklist for charities to improve their mobile fundraising, covering areas such as mobile-first design, payment method choice and reducing friction in donation journeys.

Our Place to Give, launched on 13 April by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), aims to connect philanthropic donors with local organizations and ensure that investment reaches disadvantaged communities.

DCMS says despite £14 billion being donated to charity across the UK in 2025, London currently receives more than a third of all funding from the largest philanthropic foundations.

The Chartered Institute of Fundraising (CIOF) says in a blog post:

“The Chartered Institute warmly welcomes the roadmap and sees it as a crucial next step to creating a supportive infrastructure that harnesses the true value of philanthropy.”

The CIOF blog adds that many of its members’ recommendations and ideas were taken forward, including “the importance of government visibly and vocally championing philanthropy, developing networks to educate philanthropists, and integrating philanthropy into wealth advice”.

The CIOF says that key actions included in Our Place to Give include:

• Delivering a community of practice for place-based giving initiatives
• The creation of a select group of “philanthropy ambassadors”, who will advise government, including on the topic of match-funding
• Strengthening the provision of philanthropic advice in the financial services sector

The DCMS announcement cites a recent report by Barclays, which shows that 81% of high-net-worth individuals feel it is important that financial advisers raise philanthropy proactively, but only a third have experienced their advisers doing so.

DCMS has committed £1m of funding over the next three years to support the delivery of the plan.

At the launch, Stephanie Peacock, the Minister for Sport, Tourism, Civil Society and Youth, said:

“Today’s announcement will help philanthropists across the country support local causes they are passionate about. By better connecting generous individuals with local organizations at the heart of their communities, we can unlock a new wave of giving that reaches every corner of the country.”

Carol Mack OBE, Chief Executive of the Association of Charitable Foundations (ACF), commented:

“This roadmap sends a clear signal that government understands it has a key role to play in helping place-based generosity go further, in every corner of the country. Philanthropic foundations already make a real difference in local communities, but deep geographic inequalities persist. By working closely with philanthropists — both institutions and individuals — government can benefit communities across England.”

The publication also includes 17 recommendations for the Scottish Government, its charity regulator, grantmaking foundations themselves, and the organizations which seek their grants.

The research by the University of St Andrews Business School’s Centre for the Study of Philanthropy and Public Good (CSPPG) identifies 315 charities that mainly distribute funds to other organizations, rather than run services themselves. Around half of the foundations, both in number and in terms of total funds, are based in Scotland’s two largest cities, Edinburgh and Glasgow.

These foundations generated a collective total income of £2.6bn in their last year, a figure significantly larger than the £601m of grants made. However, the researchers warned that it could be a mistake for the Scottish Government to create laws, like those seen in other countries, to force foundations to distribute a certain percentage of their assets each year.

“The modelling suggests importing a similar rule without careful design could backfire,” a CSPPG press release says, noting that it might encourage some to “cut back to the minimum”, reducing the sector’s total outlay.

Other recommendations in the report for the Government include engaging with foundations with low levels of grantmaking, and to develop further regulations for emerging forms of philanthropy, such as donor advised funds (DAFs). Meanwhile, recommendations for the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) focus on improving the data available on grantmaking foundations and charities to enable better policymaking.

On this point, the project’s lead research Dr Christopher Dougherty says:

“We now have a clearer picture of the scale of foundation wealth in Scotland, but we still lack reliable data on restrictions, investments and grant recipients. Without that, it is very difficult to design evidence-based policy.”

Meanwhile, grantmaking foundations are urged to “consider economic counter-cyclical funding practices, to increase funding when economic conditions are worse to better respond to community needs”, alongside three other recommendations around better engagement with both others in the sector, and local and national government.

Grantseekers are told to “focus on pragmatism in approaching grantmaking foundation”.

Last year, Fundraising Europe highlighted new research showing that there are approximately 175,203 foundations across Europe, with total annual expenditure of €76bn. CSPPG’s data therefore shows that Scotland’s foundation make up just under 1% of that total expenditure, but represent only 0.2% of total foundations.

Picture by Henrik Hjortshøj on Unsplash

According to the report, public donations continued to drop between 2024 and 2025, with people giving an estimated £14bn in 2025, compared to £15.4bn in 2024. The public’s mean monthly donation was £65 in 2025, down from £72 in 2024, while the median donation also declined by 9%, from £28 to £26.

Affordability and (lack of) interest

The survey respondents who did not donate to charity in 2025 were asked the reasons why. The most common response by far was ‘I can’t afford it’ (49%), followed by ‘I don’t trust charities to use my money wisely’ (19%), ‘I just didn’t want to’ (10%) and ‘There hasn’t been a charity that’s interested me enough (9%)’.

CAF says that nearly three in 10 (28%) of non-donors gave an answer suggesting that they weren’t interested in charities in general, with that figure rising to just under half (49%) of those who are higher and additional rate taxpayers – a more affluent group of UK residents, numbering roughly seven million.

For those who donate to charity, the majority are motivated by an emotional reason (78%), such as caring about the cause, and because they want to be part of something bigger (53%), such as supporting their community or making a difference.

Sectors and methods

The overseas aid and disaster relief sector has been particularly badly hit – total donations have dropped from £970m in 2016 to £727m in 2025.

Health charities have the broadest support (43% of donors supporting them last year), but on average give £27, which is on par with the sector-wide average.

While only 8% of donors gave to religious causes last year, their donations were on average far higher than for any other sector at £90 – no other sector had a figure in excess of £60. Religious charities were particularly popular among donors in Northern Ireland and the East of England, while London donors had a particular interest in environmental charities.

More than a quarter of all giving – £4bn in total – is ‘planned’, which CAF defines as meaning it comes through direct debits, standing orders, membership fees and subscriptions. Meanwhile, 40% of donors said they normally only give to charity when directly asked or moved by an appeal, and a third of donors still like to donate cash.

Mark Greer, managing director of the Charities Aid Foundation says:

“Giving falling by nearly 10% in a year will be a significant concern for charities up and down the country who are providing vital services to people in need. We have been relying on a declining number of dedicated donors, but the reality of this trend has begun to bite.

“To support our communities, we need a collaborative effort to revive the culture of giving across the country. This includes exploring ways we can encourage donations from those that can afford to give, and policy action from the Government to unlock greater giving.”