The majority of the data used to calculate the Indices of English Deprivation/IMD are administrative data, although a small amount of census data is used where gaps in the administrative data are identified.
It’s important to note that there is no absolute level of measurement, only a relative one. The example the 2019 Statistical Release gives is that:
The Indices of Deprivation measure deprivation on poland rcs data a relative rather than an absolute scale, so a neighbourhood ranked 100th is more deprived then a neighbourhood ranked 200th, but this does not mean it is twice as deprived.
Indices or calculated for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, however there is no UK-wide measure.
As an indicator, the IMD/Indices of Deprivation are not able to provide information specifically about lack of financial resources and also give no absolute measures. In addition, the way they have been calculated over time means each version is not comparable.
A limitation of the Indices of Deprivation/IMD is that when report on at local authority level, they can mask large differences.
For instance, according to the 2019 IMD scores, Kensington and Chelsea as an authority was ranked 122 out of 317 local authorities in England (with 1 being most deprived) and yet it has 23 LSOAs which are within the 20% most deprived in England (including 9 LSOAs which are within the 10% most deprived).