Please note: these are government figures on numbers of confirmed cases – some people who report symptoms are not being tested, and are not included in these counts.

Coronavirus has hit the UK hard, with the country recording hundreds of thousands of cases and over 40,000 deaths linked to the disease. England faced Europe’s highest excess death levels during the first wave of the pandemic.

Where are the UK’s current coronavirus hotspots?

At the start of the pandemic, London bore the brunt of coronavirus’s impact.

Since then, however, the centre of the virus has shifted. A number of areas have been placed under tighter restrictions because of increased infection rates since July, although some of these measures have now been lifted as cases fell.

What lockdown means varies from place to place and nation to nation. Details of the English lockdowns are listed here, Scottish lockdowns here, and Welsh here. The current Northern Irish restrictions apply to the whole country.

How is the disease progressing in the UK?

Cases in the UK first peaked in early April, before beginning to fall from May to early July. Since then, there has been an uptick in daily cases, with numbers in September passing the earlier peak – although some of this can be attributed to increased testing and targeted testing in coronavirus outbreak areas.

The number of people in hospital with coronavirus rose sharply after records started at the end of March, peaking in April. The number of people in hospitals has started to rise again – but more slowly – with the rise in cases in September.

Deaths were at their highest during the first peak of cases, with over 1,000 daily deaths seen on some days in April.

How much of the second wave is due to more testing?

Some of the sharp rise in cases in September can be attributed to increased testing. Many more tests were done in September than during the first wave in the spring.

In March and April, there were relatively few tests available and these were given to people with severe symptoms – mainly in hospitals. Most people with milder symptoms were not tested so these cases were not recorded, meaning that the actual number of coronavirus cases is likely to be much higher. Sir Patrick Vallance has said the that daily case number could have been over 100,000 on some days in the first wave.

During the start of the second wave in September, more tests were available and the majority of people took tests in the community. This means that people with milder symptoms were being tested and recorded in the official figures. The real number of cases will still be higher than the recorded count, but the testing will be picking up a greater proportion of the total amount.

However, given Covid-19’s potential for exponential growth – the shape of the cases curve is critically important, and the effect of increased cases can be seen in the hospitalisation and mortality curves above.

Find coronavirus cases near you

The chart below shows the areas that have had the highest daily peaks of new Covid-19 cases. Despite a first peak at the start of April, notably in Birmingham and Sheffield, cases in all areas were falling in May.

By July, several areas saw an uptick in cases as lockdown measures were lifted – with Leicester and areas of north-west England seeing restrictions reimposed.

Other areas have had less dramatic peaks of infection. Find the cases curve in your own area by typing into the search bar below.

In the table below, you can find out the number of cases per 100,000 in your area, both for the last week and since the start of the pandemic.

About this data

This data comes from a variety of sources: the headline figures come from Public Health England, working with devolved authorities in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland. Local authority data for England and Wales also comes from Public Health England.

Historic data for Scottish regions is only available by health board and comes from Public Health Scotland. We exclude 15 June for Scottish data owing to the fact that new historic data was added on that day.

The most recent Northern Irish data used in the maps and table comes from the NI Department of Health, but for the line charts above it comes from Public Health England, which has historic data for Northern Ireland.

There are differences in the data collection practices and publishing schedules of the sources that may lead to temporary inconsistencies.

About Covid-19

Since first being identified as a new coronavirus strain in Wuhan, China, late last year, Covid-19 has spread around the globe.

The virus can cause pneumonia. Those who have fallen ill are reported to suffer coughs, fever and breathing difficulties. You can find out more about the symptoms here.

There are things you can do, such as wearing a face mask, to protect yourself and slow the spread of the virus. Chief among them are regularly washing your hands for at least 20 seconds with soap and water, and catching coughs and sneezes in tissues.

• Due to the unprecedented and ongoing nature of the coronavirus outbreak, this article is being regularly updated to ensure that it reflects the current situation as well as possible. Any significant corrections made to this or previous versions of the article will continue to be footnoted in line with Guardian editorial policy.