The royals have made it through the first quarter of 2025 without any major calamities. They’ve stayed healthy, aside from King Charles III spending a few hours in the hospital last week with side effects of his cancer treatment.
Next week is going to be packed with significant dates, including the state visit to Italy. There are so many events — for working and non-working royals — that it’s hard to see a day when the royals won’t make headlines.
The hustle and bustle of royal life in 2025 is a major difference from last year, when both the sovereign and his daughter-in-law, Kate, Princess of Wales, were first in hospital and then revealed to the public that they had cancer. With those two senior royals focused on their health, and their spouses reducing their own schedules, those four most senior working royals did only 92 engagements in the first quarter of 2024.
This year has been remarkably different. The four most senior royals — King Charles, Queen Camilla, and the Prince and Princess of Wales — completed 270 engagements in the first quarter of 2025, an increase of nearly 200 percent from the same period in 2024.
That big increase has been driven largely by the King, who completed nearly 150 engagements in the first three months of 2025, an increase of more than 300 percent from last year. What is extraordinary about the raw numbers is that Charles III has opened a significant lead ahead of his sister, Anne, at the top of my ranking. As of March 31, he had done 46 more engagements that Anne’s 101. Normally, the gap is much, much smaller.
To put the King’s work schedule in perspective, I looked at my detailed spreadsheets on royal work since I started them eight years ago — Charles III’s workload for the first three months of this year is more than the same quarter in all other years except one: 2019.
The second biggest increase in the first quarter of 2025 was recorded by Prince William, who boosted his workload by more than 140 percent. Still, the 51 engagements completed by the heir to the throne only place him in sixth position among the 10 working royals.
Overall, the working royals completed nearly 600 engagements, an increase of 40 percent from the first three months of 2024. Only Princess Anne and Prince Edward recorded decreases of 24 and eight percent, respectively, though it should be noted that those declines are from such high bases that they ended the quarter in second and third places.
Next week will be chock-a-block with royal events.
The top story will be the state visit to Italy, during which King Charles and Queen Camilla will mark their 20th wedding anniversary.
In addition, Prince Harry’s appeal of the judicial decision in his long-running security case will be heard (Nearly a year ago, Lord Bean granted a partial appeal of Justice Lane’s judgment regarding security review, though with some reluctance: “I am persuaded, not without hesitation, that an appeal on Ground 1 would have a real prospect of success.”). In January, I published a detailed timeline of Prince Harry’s legal actions.
If that weren’t enough, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, launches her new podcast series. And on April 9, the royal family marks the fourth anniversary of the death of Prince Philip.
April 7 to 10: King and Queen on state visit to Italy (the Vatican City leg is postponed due to Pope Francis’ ill health
April 8: Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, launches her new podcast series, “Confessions of a Female Founder” on Lemonada.
April 8 and 9: Prince Harry’s appeal of the judicial decision in his security case against the government is heard in open court. In 2024, a judge ruled against him, saying he had “comprehensively lost.”
April 9: 20th wedding anniversary of King Charles and Queen Camilla (2005). Originally scheduled for April 8, it was delayed a day so Charles could attend the funeral of Pope John Paul II.
April 9: Fourth anniversary of the death of Prince Philip (2021).
It was a busy week for royal news, so I have two videos to share.
My latest on Global TV’s The Morning Show on April 1:
My Royal Roundup on Global TV’s The Morning Show on March 31: