The overall waiting list dropped by 15,845 on the previous month to 7.39m (an estimated 6.24m patients), down by 230,000 on July 2024.

Health and social care secretary, Wes Streeting said: ‘The past year is the first time in 15 years that waiting lists have fallen. There's a long way to go, but the NHS is now on the road to recovery.'

The drop in the waiting list came despite record A&E demand ahead of winter with A&E attendances and ambulance incidents both a record for October.

A&E attendances were 37,000 higher than October 2024 (2.36m). Ambulance incidents also jumped nearly 50,000 compared with October last year (806,441).

Despite the pressure, average ambulance response time for emergencies including strokes and heart attacks was almost 10 minutes faster than in October 2024 (32mins 37 seconds).

More than 2.5m (2,518,187) vital checks and tests were performed in September, almost 150,000 (148,008) more than the previous month.

For the first time this month, data is being published on the performance of individual emergency departments across the country, along with data on paediatric emergency performance and mental health delays in emergency departments over 24 hours under a commitment made in the UEC plan.

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Tim Mitchell, president of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, said: ‘Heading into the winter, we are seeing pressure on the NHS intensify. High levels of flu and emergency departments under strain will have a knock-on effect on reducing the waiting list. For surgeons, hitting ambitious Government targets is made more difficult by outdated infrastructure, which limits capacity. Too few operating theatres, existing facilities in poor condition, and ageing IT hardware and software slow them down and leave them competing for theatre time. 

‘If the Chancellor cannot spare any extra investment in the upcoming Budget, trusts must at least be given greater flexibility to raise and invest their own capital. Expanding capacity is key to meeting targets, cutting waiting times, and, most importantly, delivering care for patients without delay.'

Daniel Elkeles, chief executive, NHS Providers, said: ‘Hard work by NHS staff is paying off with waiting lists down and ambulance response times to emergency calls falling too but A&Es and ambulances are stretched to the limit, with long waits up, feeling the heat from soaring demand.

‘NHS trust leaders and staff right across the NHS – in hospital, community, mental health and ambulance services – are working flat out to see patients as quickly as they can and to cut waiting lists.'

Nuffield Trust deputy director of research, Sarah Scobie, said: ‘Still only 62% of patients waiting for planned care were seen within 18 weeks, so the NHS is clearly struggling to make meaningful progress towards its headline target. The NHS has relied in part on "data cleaning" to make bigger reductions to the list size during this year. It will be incredibly difficult to pick up the pace on this while finances are so tight, with planned redundancies and ambitious reforms only adding more pressure.'

Liberal Democrat health spokesperson Helen Morgan said: ‘Only the Liberal Democrats have a plan that can save our NHS and end corridor care. We are calling for an immediate emergency package this winter, with extra social care places so people can be discharged, 1,000 extra hospital beds, and a qualified clinician in every A&E waiting room to protect patients at risk.'

Sarah Woolnough, chief executive at The King's Fund, said: ‘NHS hospitals have been merging for years, so it is helpful that that the performance stats now include data on what is happening at each major local site within a single NHS trust and on the proportion of people with mental health problems who are waiting for care. This will better represent how patients actually experience long A&E waits when they visit their local hospital site and show that only 4% of sites met the four-hour A&E target last month.'