BackgroundPatients on kidney replacement therapy (KRT) are vulnerable to severe illness from COVID-19. Timely, accurate surveillance is essential for planning and implementing infection control at local, regional and national levels. Our aim was to compare two methods of data collection for COVID-19 infections amongst KRT patients in England.MethodsAdults receiving KRT in England were linked to two sources of data on positive COVID-19 tests recorded March-August 2020: (1) submissions from renal centres to the UK Renal Registry (UKRR) and (2) Public Health England (PHE) laboratory data. Patient characteristics, cumulative incidence by modality (in-centre haemodialysis (ICHD), home HD, peritoneal dialysis (PD) and transplant), and 28-day survival were compared between the two sources.Results2,783/54,795 patients (5.1%) had a positive test in the combined UKRR-PHE dataset. Of these 2,783, 87% had positive tests in both datasets. Capture was consistently high for PHE (> 95% across modalities) but varied for UKRR (ranging from ICHD 95% to transplant 78%,p< 0.0001). Patients captured only by PHE were more likely to be on transplant or home therapies (OR 3.5 95% CI [2.3–5.2] vs. ICHD) and to be infected in later months (OR 3.3 95%CI [2.4–4.6] for May-June, OR 6.5 95%CI [3.8–11.3] for July-August, vs. March-April), compared to patients in both datasets. Stratified by modality, patient characteristics and 28-day survival were similar between datasets.ConclusionsFor patients undergoing ICHD treatment the collection of data submitted directly by renal centres allows constant monitoring in real time. For other KRT modalities, using a national swab test dataset through frequent linkage may be the most effective method. Optimising central surveillance can improve patient care by informing interventions and assisting planning at local, regional and national levels.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12882-023-03148-8.