The Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) has published its 2025 Annual Report – Shaping the Future of Public Relations – looking back on a year of rapid technological change and renewed advocacy for professional public relations.
The report marks the first year of the CIPR’s five-year strategy, which runs to 2029, and is set against a backdrop of accelerating AI adoption, growing challenges around trust and misinformation, and a new UK government reshaping the policy landscape.
Published in an accessible online format, the report records a year of growth across the Institute. Membership rose to a record 11,580, and 178 members achieved Chartered PR Practitioner status, the highest new total on record. The Institute’s on-demand learning platform expanded from 15 modules to more than 50, and just under 3,000 members completed their CPD cycle. The CIPR also ended the year in a sound financial position, reporting an operating surplus of more than £50,000.
For practitioners, the report captures a year in which the Institute worked to protect professional standards and make the case for PR at the highest levels. It details the CIPR’s leadership on responsible AI and a volunteer-led programme of AI-focused events, its continued campaign for lobbying reform through the No Rules Britannia? report and its work in Parliament, and its ongoing focus on widening access to the profession through a new apprenticeship partnership. The Leadership and Impact annual conference, 41st Excellence Awards and first UK-wide analysis of ONS data on PR practitioners feature among the year’s highlights.
Members will have the opportunity to hear from and ask questions of the current, past, and future CIPR Presidents as well as the Institute’s Chair of the Board and CEO at the CIPR’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) on Thursday 9 July. Register online to attend.
2025 was a year that asked a great deal of our profession. Trust came under strain from every direction, artificial intelligence rewrote how we work almost overnight, and the political ground kept shifting beneath us. Through all of it, the CIPR held its nerve and its purpose, championing ethical, expert public relations worthy of the public’s confidence. This report tells the story of a profession meeting that moment, and of an Institute in good health and good heart.
Thank you to all our members for sticking with us, and to all our volunteers who dedicate so much of their time, expertise and effort in making the CIPR what it is.
Alastair McCapra, CIPR Chief Executive
- Read the CIPR’s 2025 Annual Report
- Register for the CIPR’s AGM online
