Economic and fiscal outlook

The Economic and fiscal outlook is the Office for Budget Responsibility's twice-yearly forecast document. It sets out the OBR's projections for growth, borrowing and debt, and scores whether the government's Budget decisions meet its stated fiscal rules. The OBR confirmed its next edition would be published on 28 October 2026 .

The 28 October confirmation came with no change to the 1.4% long-run productivity growth assumption that underpins the OBR's debt projections . That assumption matters because a small change in assumed productivity growth compounds over the OBR's five-year forecast horizon into a large change in projected borrowing and debt.

Because the fiscal rules are judged against the outlook's own projections, the October publication date sets the next point at which the government's headroom against those rules will be formally reassessed, rather than estimated from partial data in between.