Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
A town of 3,794 in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. 25 buildings are listed here, 0 at Category A.
Buying a home costs less than in most towns (A+): the median home sold for £125,800, 2.4 years of area income. Its schools fall short: school leavers’ results beat 10% of Scottish towns. Elsewhere it is close to typical: B for walkability and B− for hazard risk. Residents’ health trails most towns: men here can expect to live to 77.6, women to 83.3.
Figures: prices, HM Land Registry, the last three years · commuting, Census 2022 · flood risk, SEPA · life expectancy, ONS. Without street-level crime figures from Police Scotland, Macduff has no Safety Grade, and so no overall grade. The other subjects are graded below.
The 3 things Macduff does most differently from other towns.
Each subject compared with the 2,160 UK towns with an overall grade (schools within Scotland), ordered by how far Macduff is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Without street-level crime figures from Police Scotland, Macduff has no Safety Grade, and so no overall grade. The other subjects are graded below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 25 buildings inside Macduff’s locality, 15 of them in the second category.
The archive holds 1 old photo or postcard going back to 1890.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Macduff.
15% of residents are children under 15. People aged 15 to 24 make up 11% of the town, higher than Aberdeenshire’s towns (9.7%) yet lower than Scotland’s towns (12%). Macduff has a median age of 45.9 years.
51% women, 49% men
About an even split. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| Macduff | Aberdeenshire | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 15% | 17% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 11% | 9.7% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 22% | 25% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 31% | 27% | 27% |
| 65+ | 20% | 21% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 20% | 16% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 12% | 10% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 12% | 10% | 11% |
| Degree level | 17% | 29% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · Aberdeenshire and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
The town has one school, shown below.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Macduff SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 280 | – |
Social renters account for 30% of households. Behind the median of £125,800: 166 sales in Macduff’s data zones, 2023 to 2025. Private rents average £869 a month across the Aberdeen and Shire council area.
Registers of Scotland data-zone sale prices · Scottish Government council tax · Scotland’s Census 2022 tenure · OGL · The Scottish median is our estimate from data-zone sales, brought to early-2025 prices.
At the census, 81% of people in Macduff called their health good or very good, lower than Aberdeenshire’s towns (83%) yet higher than Scotland’s towns (78%). 23% of residents have a disability, above Aberdeenshire’s towns (20%) but below Scotland’s towns (24%).
| Census 2022 | Macduff | Aberdeenshire | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 81% | 83% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 5.1% | 4.5% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 23% | 20% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL · The census answers take no account of age, so a young town looks healthier; the Health Grade relies on age-adjusted measures, life expectancy and early deaths among them.
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 21% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
There are 0.6 jobs in Macduff for each resident in work. Of the commuters living here, 20% work in the town itself. Short trips to work, under 5 km: 53%, higher than both Aberdeenshire’s towns (37%) and Scotland’s towns (44%). At the census, just over a fifth of workers worked mainly from home.
Scotland’s Census 2022 (NRS), method of travel and distance to work · DWP claimant count · OGL
The heritage lists give each building’s grade but not its age, so we don’t say which is oldest.
Category B covers 15 of them. Macduff counts 25 listed buildings on the national list (Historic Environment Scotland): 15 Category B.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Macduff. Best known first.
Museum · Historic Environment ScotlandDuff House1.1 km outside town, to the southwestMuseumMuseumMuseum of Banff1 km outside town, to the westAttractionAttractionMacduff Distillery800 m outside town, to the southwestPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
25 listed buildings in Macduff.
17 Shore Street, Town Hall: Photo: Bill Harrison · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Church Street, Burgh Cross: Photo: Leslie Barrie · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Skene Street, Manor House Including Summerhouse, Boundary Walls and Railings: Photo: Anne Burgess · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Geograph · The Knowes, War Memorial: Photo: Leslie Barrie · CC BY-SA 2.0
The nearest towns and villages, from National Records of Scotland’s 2022 localities. See them on the map →
Homes cost less than in most UK towns: the median sale over three years was £125,800, against £277,000 in the typical town in England and Wales. On cost of living it is the 7th most affordable of 296 Scottish towns.
That is 2.7 times the typical town in England and Wales for its size.
GCSE results trail 90% of towns in England (Department for Education, Attainment 8). One state school is inside the town; places are handled by the local council.
Town in Aberdeenshire, Scotland
Macduff is a locality of 3,794 people, in the Aberdeenshire council area. TownRatings uses National Records of Scotland’s 2022 localities as Scotland’s towns: the physical town, as people mean the word, rather than a council area, so its figures cover the town itself. Localities split the big settlements into their towns, as ONS’s 2022 boundaries split conurbations in England and Wales.
Built from NRS geography and Census 2022
Sources: Scotland’s Census 2022 (National Records of Scotland), output areas summed to the NRS 2022 locality · Registers of Scotland house price statistics, medians and quartiles of residential sales by 2022 data zone, 2004 to 2025 (the 2023 to 2025 headline brought to early-2025 prices with each council’s medians) · Scottish Government, Council Tax by band 2026-27; Scottish Water charges 2026-27 · Scottish Government, Recorded Crime in Scotland (crimes, offences and clear-up rates by council area, 2016-17 to 2025-26); Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation 2020v2 crime domain and SIMD crime indicators (2014/15, 2017/18), 2011 data zones with Census 2022 residents · ONS gross disposable household income by council (2022), scaled to household income on England and Wales’s councils, with Scotland’s Census 2022 households · DWP / ONS Claimant Count via Nomis (2022 data zones, January to August 2026), over residents aged 16 to 64 at Scotland’s Census 2022; council series since 2015 · Scottish Government school contact list (31 July 2026) and school summary statistics (pupil census, September 2025); School Information Dashboard leavers’ attainment by school, 2022-23 to 2024-25 (data.gov.scot) · TownRatings grades: our own summary of the data, ranked against UK towns only. All under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (ONS boundaries). Northern Ireland: Source: NISRA; contains Land & Property Services data and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland information, © Crown copyright, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Scotland: contains National Records of Scotland data, Registers of Scotland data and SEPA data, © Crown copyright / © SEPA 2025, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.