Young men in UK are not more rightwing than older groups, study says

Exclusive: Analysis shows men aged 18 to 25 are less likely to vote for rightwing parties than other age groups of men

Young men are not turning to rightwing politics more than any other demographic, according to a study of election data , which undermines claims that this group has been a key driver of the recent success of parties such as Reform UK .

The analysis of data from the British Election Study, which polls about 30,000 people every year, showed age to be a bigger determining factor in voters’ political opinions than gender.

And while men aged 18 to 25 are less progressive than women of the same age, they remain more progressive, and less likely to vote for rightwing parties, than any other age group of men.

Analysts at the Institute for Public Policy Research, which carried out the study, said the findings should prompt politicians to rethink how they engage with young men, who are sometimes written off as lost to misogynistic online influencers.

Dr Chris Bick, the lead author of the report, said: “There is a sense that young men are shifting rapidly to the right, but we have not found much evidence for that at all. They remain the most progressive cohort of men across a raft of issues.”

He added: “If you are interested in advancing progressive politics, this is still a base of support for you. Politicians looking to appeal to younger voters will have to make sure they do not alienate this cohort by trying too much to appeal to older voters.”

Many commentators have highlighted the apparent appeal of populist rightwing politics for young men in recent years in the UK and abroad.

Politicians have warned about the rise of online influencers such as Andrew Tate who, as part of the “ manosphere ”, have looked to appeal to young men with messages about aggression and misogyny.

Some Labour MPs have become so concerned about the political alienation of young men that they recently set up a group specifically to spread messages among that group and steer them away from “toxic influencers”.

Polls showed populist rightwing parties were doing better with young men than with young women. Recent research from King’s College London showed 13% of young men aged between 18 and 24 voted for Reform UK compared with just 6% of women.

But the IPPR research showed that, while young men have moved further to the right in recent years, they have only done so in line with other groups, and remained considerably more progressive as a bloc than other age groups.

The data showed that support for conservative parties among men aged 18 to 25 rose from about 18% in 2022 to just under 30% in 2025.

This mirrored the rise among older men, about 35% of whom supported conservative parties in 2022, compared with more than 50% last year.

More recently, men aged 18 to 25 have become about 5 percentage points more likely to support Reform UK since the election – far less than men and women of any older age group, among whom support for the party has surged.

On a series of issues, including immigration, race, women’s rights and homosexuality, young men are more progressive than older ones. They are, however, more conservative than women of the same age, with the gap between the sexes more noticeable among younger people than older ones.

Bick said that while a gender gap had emerged among young voters on many issues, this was being driven more by younger women turning to the left than young men going right.

Younger women are far more likely to support greater diversity in school curriculums, for example, or to believe that children’s television shows should portray more same-sex families than any other group.

“Young women are moving to the left more than young men are moving to the right,” he said. “Though that divergence is more noticeable in other countries.”