New Digital Hub Launched to Support Best Start in Life

Toddler touching his pregnant mother's stomach. She is smiling and they are sitting on the floor in a bedroom with a teddy bear and bowl of fruit next to them.

New Digital Hub Launched to Support Best Start in Life

As part of the government’s Best Start in Life strategy, a new digital hub is now available. Its aim is to bring together information and support for parents, from pregnancy to school, and it will sit alongside the rolling out of the in-person Best Start Family Hubs nationwide.

The centralised digital hub complements the in-person hubs by bringing together online resources previously found on separate sites like Childcare Choices and the NHS Start for Life. It is designed to be a single, trusted source of information, reducing the confusion of searching for advice online and will provide information across a wide range of subjects:

• Integrated information: It brings together government and NHS support services to make it easier for parents to find help.
• Parenting support: Advice on topics from pregnancy and early development, such as breastfeeding and weaning.
• Childcare information: It includes details on government childcare schemes, eligibility, and tools like childcare support checkers.
• Educational resources: The hub provides information on early education, key skills for starting school, and a map of local breakfast clubs.
• Local connections: Help for families to find local support and links to other services.

It also aims to make it easier to access early education and childcare by targeting areas where there has been a low take up of the funded entitlement expansion (which now allows eligible working families to access up to 30 hours of funded early education and childcare for children aged nine months and over).

Starting from April 2026, the in person Best Start Family Hubs will be part of an expansion of family support services, offering help from conception, through a child's early years, to later childhood, up to 19 years (or 25 for young people with special educational needs and disabilities). This will also include:

• A new Best Start Family service: A rebuilding of critical family services, taking learning from the best of the Sure Start, Family Hubs and Start for Life approaches. This will be supported by the Best Start digital service, linked to ‘My Children’ on the NHS app.
• Best Start Family Hubs in every local authority: These services will be targeted at low-income families and those with additional vulnerabilities and based in disadvantaged communities where they are needed most. Best start family hubs will include professionals working across all local teams, including health and education, and will work with nurseries, childminders, schools, health services, libraries and local voluntary and community groups.
• Strengthening health services: There will be improved integration with health services that will include maternity care, health visiting services, vaccinations, and dental care.
• Accountability and innovation: Every local authority will have targets on child development in their area, and they will work with health and voluntary and community sector organisations, to achieve those.

Sources and more information:
1. https://www.beststartinlife.gov.uk/
2. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/giving-every-child-the-best-start-in-life/giving-every-child-the-best-start-in-life
3. https://www.local.gov.uk/toolkit/giving-every-child-best-start-life/best-start-family-hubs-and-family-help-services-overview