The pound abroad
£1 bought 1.9385 dollars on 2 January 1991 and 1.3476 dollars on 5 November 2026, about 30% fewer dollars. A weaker pound mostly matters for holidays and imported goods.
The pound's buying power
Same pound.
Different amount abroad.
A pound stays a pound at home. Abroad, what it buys depends on the exchange rate. A weaker pound mostly matters for holidays and for imported goods. The US dollar and a Bank of England basket of currencies show how that has changed since 1991.
Dated snapshot: 7 November 2026 (GMT), using the latest official figures published by then. Not a live price feed. Usually updated monthly.
Comparisons of what a pound buys
A few comparisons
What a pound buys in other currencies
Here the question is “how much foreign money does £1 buy?” So we quote the rate as US dollars per pound: a higher number means each pound buys more dollars. For a wider view, the Bank of England's sterling effective exchange rate compares the pound with a trade-weighted basket of currencies, including the euro and other trading partners.
| Measure | 2 January 1991 | 5 November 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| US dollars per £1 | 1.9385 dollars | 1.3476 dollars | −30%: each pound buys about 0.70 times as many dollars |
| Sterling effective exchange rate (Jan 2005 = 100) | 99.4 | 86.6 | −13% against the basket |
Seen the other way, £1 bought 1.94 dollars in early 1991 and 1.35 dollars now, so 1 dollar cost about 52p then and 74p now. Exchange rates are wholesale market rates; travel money and card payments usually cost more.
How the pound abroad has changed over the last 10 years
As of 5 November 2026, the latest Bank of England daily rate: 1.3476 US dollars per £1 | Sterling effective exchange rate: 86.6.
Lookbacks use 5 November in each earlier year, or the nearest earlier published day (2023 uses 3 November; 2022 uses 4 November; 2017 uses 3 November; 2016 uses 4 November).
| Period | US dollars per £1 | Sterling effective exchange rate |
|---|---|---|
| 1 year | +3.3% | +4.1% |
| 2 years | +3.6% | +2.2% |
| 3 years | +8.9% | +6.6% |
| 4 years | +19% | +13% |
| 5 years | −0.1% | +7.0% |
| 6 years | +3.5% | +11% |
| 7 years | +4.7% | +9.2% |
| 8 years | +3.5% | +9.9% |
| 9 years | +3.1% | +12% |
| 10 years | +7.4% | +14% |
These are changes in the quoted pound figure, not returns after costs or tax. A plus sign means the pound buys more abroad than it did then. Not financial advice.
An illustration, not an inflation meter
Exchange rates are not the same as UK consumer inflation. A weaker pound makes imports and holidays abroad cost more pounds, but prices in other countries change too, and the ONS shopping basket measures what happens to prices here. Interest rates, trade, investment flows and news all move currencies, sometimes sharply.
The pound can rise as well as fall against other currencies. Choosing another start date changes the comparison. This page is not a substitute for the ONS CPI basket.
Not financial advice, and not currency-trading advice.
Sources and how the figures were made
US dollars per pound: Bank of England statistical database, series XUDLUSS, spot exchange rate, US dollars into sterling, daily. Basket: series XUDLBK67, sterling effective exchange rate index, January 2005 = 100, daily. Both downloaded on 7 November 2026; the latest published day was 5 November 2026. The Bank publishes these rates from London market observations at about 4pm on working days, so there are no weekend values. Bank of England data are used under its terms.
The charts use the first published business day of each year from 1991 (2 January 1991) and the latest day, joined with straight lines; they hide moves within each year. Download the daily rates from 1991 (CSV).
The 1-to-10-year table: each cell is (latest / lookback − 1) × 100, with a leading plus or minus sign; changes below 10% in magnitude are shown to one decimal place, larger ones to a whole percentage. Download the table lookback dates, rates and calculations (CSV).