There are now 6,495 GP practices in England, according to figures for June 2022 from NHS Digital - down 20% from 8,106 in April 2013.
Over the same period, numbers of patients registered with GP practices have risen by 10% from just over 56m to 61.7m - driving the average list size of GP practices in England above 9,500 for the first time.
The fall in practice numbers and rising numbers of registered patients have driven average practice list size up by 37% in less than a decade, analysis by GPonline shows.
The figures underline the speed of change in general practice since NHS England became operational - and come alongside a decline in the GP workforce and an exponential drop in numbers of GP partners.
Data on the GP workforce are only available as far back as September 2015 - but in the period since then, full-time equivalent (FTE), fully qualified GPs per 100,000 patients have fallen from around 52 to 45, a 12% drop.
Over the same period, the number of GP partners in England has fallen by around 22%, while the number of GPs in salaried roles has grown by around 44%.
In September 2015 - less than seven years ago - partners made up 74% of the FTE, fully qualified GP workforce, a figure that fell to just 61% in April 2022.
GP reform
The figures come after health and social care secretary Sajid Javid said last week that the current model of primary care was 'not working' - and that he would soon publish a 'plan for change'.
Mr Javid has previously been linked with plans to 'nationalise' general practice, and earlier this year wrote the foreword to a think-tank report that said the independent contractor model of general practice was in 'terminal decline'.
The Policy Exchange report also called for the end of the GMS contract within a decade and proposed to shift general practice into a predominantly salaried service working in larger units.
