How India has overtaken the UK as the world’s fifth-largest economy

Based on current prices, UK GDP is smaller than it was before the 2008 financial crisis.

The gap between the Indian and British economies is expected to rise to almost a trillion dollars in the next five years. Photo by Indranil Aditya/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Seventy-five years since it obtained independence from the British Empire, India has overtaken Britain as the world’s fifth largest economy.

According to the International Monetary Fund, India’s economy in the closing days of the first quarter of 2022 was $150bn bigger than the UK’s. India’s GDP was $3.53 trillion, compared with the UK’s $3.38 trillion.

IMF forecasts project this gap to widen in the years to come, reaching almost a trillion dollars by 2027.

On current prices, the UK economy has been something short of stagnant since the Great Recession. In 2007 UK GDP amounted to $3.11tn. In 2014 it had barely recovered, at $3.09 trillion. Before the Covid-19 recession in 2020 it was $2.76 trillion.