Law Society's portrait of a profession

The number of solicitors has increased, but more of them are working in-house and there are fewer law firms, official figures show. One in five practicing solicitors now work in-house, up from 15% in 2000, according to the Law Society’s annual statistics. One in five work in the City. As of 31 July 2015, there were 133,367 practising solicitors, a 2.3% rise. There were 9,403 law firms, a drop of more than 1,000 compared to five years ago. There are roughly equal numbers of men and women listed as practising solicitors.