Britain reported 27,301 new COVID-19 cases on Friday, a slight fall from the previous day's all-time high but the second-highest daily figure recorded, official government statistics showed.
The figure was down slightly on Thursday's case number of 33,470, which was a single-day record, although Britain's testing capacity has also grown since the first wave of the pandemic.
There were 376 new deaths reported, down from 563 reported on Thursday.