As the world mourned the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, many wondered how the institution she headed would adapt. With a long list of royal engagements and public appearances, the Queen had, for many, become synonymous with dedication and duty.

However, despite expectations of a significant shift in how work is allocated within “The Firm”, our research can reveal that it is still Princess Anne and other older members of the family who continue to take up the largest share of engagements.

Here at The Grade we have scraped hundreds of pieces of data on The Royal Court Circular to determine who can be crowned the hardest-working member of the royal family of King Charles III’s reign so far. 

The leaderboard looks like this:

royal list

It is Princess Anne who tops the list of the hardest-working Royals during the reign of King Charles so far. An impressive 135 engagements underscore how she is still at the forefront of the Royal Family’s activities, racking up more engagements than William and Kate combined.

At 72 she shows no signs of slowing down in her royal engagements, with her work being all the more important within a newer “slimmed down” royal family that has seen its working numbers reduced by 5 over recent years.

Newly appointed King Charles III comes in second place with 104 engagements across his reign showing his intention to lead from the front.

Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh just edges her husband in total number of engagements. The couple have undertaken a combined 135 engagements which reflects, along with their recent title change, their central position within the affairs of the Crown.

At the other end of the list is Princess Alexandra, who this calendar year has only had 15 engagements – which at 86 years of age may be no surprise.

How Many Engagements Did Each Royal Family Member Do Each Month?

1) Anne, Princess Royal

Prince Anne tops our list as the hardest-working royal. She carried out a huge 30 engagements in November 2022, helping to deliver continuity between her mother’s and her brother’s reign.

April has seen the fewest number of engagements – as is the case for most working royals – presumably as they prepare for the upcoming Coronation Service.

2) King Charles III

King Charles similarly had a very busy start to his reign. In November and in March he took on 21 engagements. His least busy months were December and April when he took only 6. This is likely to be due to the Christmas slowdown and also preparations for the May coronation.

3) Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh

duchess of edinburgh engagements

Sophie has marginally beaten her husband into 4th place by taking on one more engagement than him. The Firm’s “secret weapon” as she has been dubbed is showing every intention of taking her promotion to Duchess of Edinburgh (she was previously Countess of Wessex) very seriously indeed.

4) Edward, Duke of Edinburgh

Edward is the last working royal on our list out of the children of the late Queen Elizabeth II. However, he has still racked up an admirable 67 engagements. His busiest month was November when he completed 20 engagements.

5) Prince William, Prince of Wales

The first in line to the throne has fallen short of his father, uncles and aunt in terms of the number of engagements. However, he has managed to amass 31% more engagements than his wife, Catherine the Princess of Wales.

November was his busiest month with 17 engagements. Despite preparations for the coronation, he has managed to increase his engagements by 3% when compared to the same period last year.

6) Prince Richard, Duke of Gloucester

Prince Richard is the cousin of Queen Elizabeth II and has been a working royal since 1974. Despite his age (he turns 79 in August), he had had 54 engagements in the reign of Charles II.

His busiest month was November with 17 engagements.

7) Camilla, Queen Consort

Camilla comes in at number 8 on our list. The newly appointed Queen Consort’s busiest month was November with 15 engagements. She has slowed down her engagements in April as she prepared to take a central role within in the coronation.

8) Catherine, Princess of Wales

We have not seen Kate move to the front of the Royals’ public business as some might expect. She has managed to put in just 35% of the total amount of engagements that Princess Anne has. However, she has shown consistency across months (barring April) and has done so despite a demanding family life.

9) Birgitte, Duchess of Gloucester

The wife of Prince Richard managed 46 engagements with November being her most demanding month (17 engagements).

10) Prince Edward, Duke of Kent

Another cousin of Queen Elizabeth, Prince Edward has 44 engagements to his name. This is an extraordinary achievement at 88 years of age.

11) Princess Alexandra

The last cousin of Queen Elizabeth on the list, Princess Alexandra has only taken one engagement this year. At the age of 86 and with talk of a “slimmed down monarchy” this lower baseline may become the new normal.

Methodology

1. Using The Royal Court Circular the number of daily engagements was collated and added together for each working member of the royal family between 01/10/2022 and 31/04/2023.

2. The Duke of York and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were not included in this study as they have ceased to be working members of the royal family.

3. Princess Beatrice and Eugene were not included in this study as their engagements are not listed on The Royal Court Circular.

4. All data was collected on 01/05/2023 and was accurate, as far as reflected in The Royal Court Circular, at that date.