How to engage with the CMA’s childcare market study

Below we set out our roadmap for the market study, and how you can engage with us.

We are looking at:

• how the sector works
• how well it performs for families, childcare professionals and providers
• how it could work better

We are focusing on the supply of early years education and childcare services in England, for pre-school aged children from birth until they start school aged 4 or 5 years old.

Work in the childcare sector aligns strongly with our strategic objectives. Across all our work, we focus on delivering tangible benefits for the economy, its citizens and businesses. In particular, as set out in our  2026 to 2029 Strategy, the CMA aims to improve household prosperity by promoting competition and protecting consumers, with a particular focus on areas of essential spend and at moments of vulnerability.

Market study timeline

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Launch – July 2026:

• market study notice​
• consultation on scope​
• call for views from families, professionals, and providers and other interested people​
• webinar

Engagement, evidence gathering & analysis​ – July to December 2026​

• commissioned research​
• engagement with providers, stakeholders and sector experts
• information requests and questionnaires​
• analysing market data and international comparisons
• working closely with UK and local governments and regulatory bodies​
• public update on emerging thinking

Consultation​ – December 2026 to April 2027​

• consultation on emerging thinking and any possible options for improving outcomes​
• further targeted evidence gathering and analysis​
• deepening our understanding and shaping possible options for improvements

Final report – May 2027​

• publishing our final report

The dates are included as a guide and may be updated.

The CMA will conduct the market study in line with its  4Ps framework: Pace, Predictability, Proportionality, Process.  

We will update this page throughout the market study, and you can subscribe to get emails when we update it. The button to opt in for email notifications can be found at the top of the page. You can also sign up to the mailing list to receive updates about this market study.

Launch: July 2026

On 1 July 2026 we launched a market study, which we expect to last for 11 months.

We published a statement of scope, which:

• explains why we are launching a market study
• sets out the proposed scope of the market study
• sets out at a high-level some potential outcomes from the market study (‘remedies’)

We invited views on the proposed scope of the market study, and set out a number of questions in our statement of scope to help inform responses. The deadline for responses was 26 July 2026.

We published the responses to our statement of scope.

We also ran a call for views to gather first-hand insights on how the sector is working more generally. We invited views from families, early years education and childcare professionals and providers on their experiences of using or providing early years education and childcare services, as well as views from other interested people and organisations. The call for views closed on 26 July 2026.

We have also published a market study notice, which sets out the scope and timescale of the study, and the period during which representations may be made to the CMA.

Webinars: Introduction to our early years education and childcare services market study

We held 2 webinars on 15 and 16 July on how the market study will run, what it means for the sector and how to engage with us throughout the market study.

Webinar: Childcare market study launch webinar

Webinar: Childcare market study launch webinar for providers

Engagement, initial evidence gathering and analysis: July to December 2026

We will undertake initial evidence gathering and analysis to understand whether the sector is working as well as it could.

We will engage with, and gather evidence from, a range of stakeholders throughout the market study to ensure we can benefit from a wide range of perspectives.

We expect to engage with, amongst others:

• families, carersincluding parents and guardians with a child (or children) of pre-school age, as well as consumer groups
• early years education and childcare professionals and providers – ranging from large corporate groups to small and medium-sized providers, as well as childminders
• the UK and local governments, and regulatory bodies
• sector and professional representative organisations, academics, expert groups, and organisations with a policy interest in the sector

We expect to engage and gather evidence in a number of ways, including through:

• running a call for views, inviting information from families, professionals and providers, and other interested people, which closesclosed on 26 July 2026
• responses to our statement of scope consultation, which closesclosed on 26 July 2026
• commissioning third-party research
• collecting information using our statutory information gathering powers and through informal channels (such as questionnaires) sent to key market participants
• hosting industry roundtables and meetings with providers, industry associations, regulators and other stakeholders
• engaging with sector experts – which may include business experts, academics, and policy researchers – to consider the CMA’s emerging thinking, and ensure our work is informed by expert knowledge and insight
• analysing available market data and international comparisons
• working closely with the UK and local governments, including to understand applicable regulatory and policy frameworks
• working closely with regulatory bodies

The scope of our market study is England-only, because the funding arrangements and regulations are very different in each nation. However, we are interested in insights from other parts of the UK, and will draw out lessons from our analysis for devolved governments’ consideration. We will engage with the devolved governments to seek any input and share these insights.

During this period:

• we will refine our areas of focus against the evidence gathered, informed by tools such as internal state of play (ISOP) meetings
• we will provide public updates as our understanding develops

Read our update, published in September 2026. This document provides an update on the evidence gathering we have been doing since we launched our market study, what we have heard so far, and how our thinking is developing as the study progresses.

At the end of this period, we expect to publish our emerging thinkingfindings and (if we identify concerns) our emerging thinking on possible options for improving outcomes.

Consultation on emerging thinking and potential remedies: December to April 2027

We will invite views from interested stakeholders on our emerging thinking and any possible options for improving outcomes.

Alongside this, we will undertake further targeted evidence gathering and analysis to deepen our understanding of the sector and shape possible options for improvements.

Final report

We expect to publish our final report setting out our conclusions from the market study, and any remedies in May 2027.

Contact

Contact the team at: childcare@cma.gov.uk

If you would like to hear from us about this market study you can sign up to our mailing list.