As a division of the Home Office (HO), it provides passports for British nationals worldwide.

The General Register Office for England and Wales, which produces life event certificates for births, deaths, marriages, and civil partnerships, became a subsidiary of HMPO on 1 April 2008.

[2][3][4] The department was known as Her Majesty's Passport Office, until Queen Elizabeth II's death on 8 September 2022 and the subsequent inheritance of the throne by Charles III; it has since been renamed to reflect the change of monarch.

In 2007, the ninety British diplomatic missions that issued passports were consolidated into seven regional passport processing centres (RPPCs) based in Düsseldorf, Hong Kong, Madrid, Paris, Pretoria, and Washington, D.C. and Wellington, with an additional centre in Dublin.

On 1 April 2011, responsibility for British passports issued overseas passed from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to IPS.