Around three million UK pension pots remain lost, representing an approximate value of £18.7bn and an average pot size of £6,220, the Pensions Policy Institute (PPI) has found.

Its Lost Pensions: The scale of the challenge report, supported by the Money and Pensions Service (Maps), used an updated methodology and achieved its highest market coverage to date, covering around 75 per cent of workplace defined contribution (DC) pots, meaning the findings are not directly comparable with previous surveys and instead provide a new lower-bound estimate of the scale and value of lost pension pots.

It found that 81.88 per cent of lost pension pots, around 2.5 million, belonged to people aged under 55, representing £12.9bn of lost assets.

The PPI said this reflected factors including restrictions on pension access before age 55, automatic enrolment, employment patterns and higher job mobility among younger workers.

In contrast, around 8,000 lost pots, or 0.26 per cent of the total, belonged to people aged over 75.

However, the report found that this age group had the highest proportion of lost pots per age cohort, with 13 per cent of pots linked to over-75s considered lost.

The research also showed that women’s average lost pension wealth was more than 20 per cent lower than men’s.

The average lost pension pot was valued at £6,830 for men and £5,370 for women.

For the first time, the survey included evidence on defined benefit (DB) pensions. While the research was not able to estimate the overall scale of lost DB entitlements, it suggested that lost benefits exist across different scheme types and could be enough to have an impact on member outcomes.

Commenting on the findings, PPI deputy director, Dr Suzy Morrissey, said: “As the PPI’s new figures show, lost pension pots remain a significant issue for savers, providers, and policymakers.

“At a time when pensions policy decision-making could particularly impact tomorrow’s retirement adequacy challenges, the PPI is proud to provide an updated examination of this multi-billion pound policy issue potentially affecting millions of individuals.”

Maps CEO, Oliver Morley, added: "With around 2.5 million lost pensions belonging to people aged under 55, there is a need to ensure no-one is missing savings for the retirement they want.

“The MoneyHelper Pensions Dashboard being developed by Maps, expected to launch in financial year 2027/28, will help tackle this problem. As well as a single overview of pensions in one place, a dashboard will show pensions that people may have lost touch with.

“While this is only part of the important work to ensure people have the retirement savings they need, it is a vital part of making planning for later life easier."

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