More than 650,000 people in the UK received a dose of the coronavirus vaccine on Thursday setting a new national record for the most coronavirus shots given out in one day.

Government figures revealed 660,276 doses were administered nationwide, among them 528,260 first doses and a further 132,016 second doses.

Thursday's figure eclipses the one set on January 30 when 609,010 vaccines were administered, among them 598,389 first doses and 10,621 second doses.

26,263,732 people have now received their first dose while 2,011,070 have received a second dose. Additionally, slightly less than half of the UK's adult population (49.9 percent) has received a first dose of the vaccine.

The government maintains it is on course to achieve its objective of offering all adults in the UK a vaccine by the end of July.

The UK's medicines regulator on Thursday concluded that the benefits of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine far outweigh the risks while Europe's top drug regulator deemed it "safe and effective".

Meanwhile, 4,802 new confirmed cases were reported across the UK on Friday in addition to 101 deaths.

The UK has so far reported more than 4.2 million confirmed coronavirus cases and more than 126,000 deaths.

(With input from agencies)