Photo: Kenneth Allen · CC BY-SA 2.0How Causeway Coast and Glens stacks up
Alongside low crime (violent crime 22% below the figure for Northern Ireland), Causeway Coast and Glens has car dependence and shorter healthy lives (63.5 years of healthy life expectancy). That balance adds up to a B overall and 30th place among the UK’s areas. Only two Northern Ireland council areas get fewer of their pupils to five good GCSEs including English and maths than Causeway Coast and Glens: 71% of pupils get five or more GCSEs at A*–C including English and maths.
Each subject puts the official figure for the whole council area beside a measure built from our town grades. How this works
Safety
12th of 65A−83/100 Safe with few exceptions. Police recorded 18.3 violent and sexual offences per 1,000 residents over the past year, 22% below the figure for Northern Ireland (5th lowest of 65 areas with police.uk figures). Dungiven leads its towns at #192 of 2,138; 40% of town residents live in top-quarter towns.
Counting every recorded crime, not just violence: 37 per 1,000 a year (5th lowest).
Source: police.uk street-level crime (Police Service of Northern Ireland), September 2025 to August 2026; Census 2021 residents.
Measure: recorded crime against residents (violence, burglary, vehicle crime, criminal damage), as in our Safety grades. The top quarter is the best-placed towns holding a quarter of the people in the UK’s 2,138 graded towns. 7 Causeway Coast and Glens towns.
Low crime nearly everywhere
Its safest towns are Portstewart (#339), Ballymoney (#479) and Ballycastle (#733), ranked against every graded town in the UK.
| County | Safest quarter | Most-crime quarter | Split |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ards and North Down | 100% | 0% | |
| Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon | 100% | 0% | |
| Lisburn and Castlereagh | 100% | 0% | |
| Mid Ulster | 100% | 0% | |
| Antrim and Newtownabbey | 78% | 0% | |
| Causeway Coast and Glens | 40% | 0% |
Where crimes are counted
police.uk places every crime at a street or public place near where it happened, never an address, and we count it where that point falls. The council area figure counts violent and sexual offences everywhere in Causeway Coast and Glens, including town centres, stations and shopping streets. Town grades count the crimes that touch residents where they live (violence, burglary, vehicle crime and criminal damage), so a town with a busy centre is not marked down for its shoplifting.
Schools
55th of 90C+39/100 Results slightly under the middle for Northern Ireland. At GCSE it ranks 3rd lowest of 11 Northern Ireland council areas, with 71% of pupils getting five good grades including English and maths. Its towns beat the area-wide figure. Town by town it lands near the middle, with Dungiven its best at #29 of 2,331.
Source: Department of Education school performance: pupils with five or more GCSEs at A*–C including English and maths, every post-primary school in the district. Ranked among Northern Ireland’s districts.
Measure: our Schools grade: primary and secondary results of the schools in and around each town. The top quarter is the best-placed towns holding a quarter of the people in the UK’s 2,331 graded towns. 7 Causeway Coast and Glens towns.
Cost of living
14th of 98A87/100 Consistently affordable. No area puts more of its town residents in the most affordable quarter of towns (100%). Northern Ireland’s official house price figures put the typical home at £201,100, or 4.0 years of average household income, against 3.9 across Northern Ireland. Derry City and Strabane, Mid and East Antrim and Mid Ulster all do better on affordability.
Typical sale price: £201,100 (1,728 sales, 36th lowest).
Average domestic rates bill £1,244 (Northern Ireland has rates, not council tax). Shown for context.
Source: NISRA and Land & Property Services median house prices, brought up to date with each district’s house price index; household income estimated from ONS household income (GDHI) per head and household size; ONS Price Index of Private Rents (August 2026); domestic rates. Prices: NISRA/LPS median of all verified residential sales in 2024, brought to 2025Q3..2026Q2 prices with the LGD's LPS house price index; 5-year change = LPS index 2025Q3..2026Q2 vs 2020Q3..2021Q2.
Measure: our Cost of living grade: prices and rents against local income, plus council tax. The top quarter is the best-placed towns holding a quarter of the people in the UK’s 2,515 graded towns. 7 Causeway Coast and Glens towns.
Health
90th of 98D8/100 Among the least healthy areas. Healthy life expectancy at birth is 63.5 years (men and women averaged), 1.5 years fewer than the figure for Northern Ireland. None of its towns makes the top quarter; Ballymoney comes closest, at #1,514 of 2,515.
Total life expectancy is 81.2 years (6th longest).
Source: ONS healthy life expectancy by district, 2022 to 2024 (a survey-based figure, converted to the scale of the England and Wales small-area figures), and NISRA life expectancy; men and women averaged. Ranked among Northern Ireland’s districts only.
Measure: our Health grade: ONS life and healthy life expectancy, Census health, and OHID indicators in England. The top quarter is the best-placed towns holding a quarter of the people in the UK’s 2,515 graded towns. 7 Causeway Coast and Glens towns.
Jobs & income
37th of 98B63/100 Incomes a notch above average. The average household income is £50,800 a year.
Claimant rate: 2.9% of 16 to 64-year-olds claim out-of-work benefits (August 2026), 38th lowest. Counted half in the grade.
Source: Household income estimated from ONS household income (GDHI) per head and household size (Northern Ireland has no small-area income figures); claimant count (August 2026) by district.
Causeway Coast and Glens has no graded towns of 2,500 or more with this measure, too few to compare town by town (we need 5); its grade rests on the official figure.
Getting about
92nd of 98D6/100 The car is close to essential. No town here reaches the top quarter for the UK; its best is Coleraine, #1,006. At the 2021 Census, 9% of people travelling to work went on foot, by bike or by public transport, 4 points below the figure for Northern Ireland.
Worked mainly from home at the 2021 Census: 17% of workers (context; they are left out of the commuting share).
Source: NISRA Census 2021, method of travel to work by district; people working mainly from home left out.
Measure: our Walkability grade: how many everyday places are within reach on foot. The top quarter is the best-placed towns holding a quarter of the people in the UK’s 2,515 graded towns. 7 Causeway Coast and Glens towns.
Flood risk
Not gradedNot graded: no flood-risk data for Northern Ireland yet. We have not yet loaded flood-risk maps for Northern Ireland, so its council areas, like its towns, have no flood-risk grade. Their overall grade weighs the other subjects.
Growth
86th of 98D12/100 Slow growth. The population grew 0.7% between 2011 and 2024, to 141,954, against 6.3% across Northern Ireland (12th slowest). Every neighbour scores higher, Derry City and Strabane, Mid and East Antrim and Mid Ulster among them.
From 2021 to 2024 alone, +0.2% (10th slowest).
Source: NISRA mid-year population estimates, 2011 and 2024.
Causeway Coast and Glens has no graded towns of 2,500 or more with this measure, too few to compare town by town (we need 5); its grade rests on the official figure.
How Causeway Coast and Glens compares to its neighbours
Against Derry City and Strabane, Mid and East Antrim and Mid Ulster, Causeway Coast and Glens trails on cost of living and growth.
| Causeway Coast and Glens | Derry City and Strabane | Mid and East Antrim | Mid Ulster | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | B 5530th of 65 | C− 1655th of 65 | B 5927th of 65 | A+ 1001st of 65 |
| Safety | A− 835th official · 40% in top towns | C+ 3819th official · 9% in top towns | A 899th official · 68% in top towns | A+ 1001st official · 100% in top towns |
| Schools | C+ 399th official · 13% in top towns | C− 168th official · 0% in top towns | C− 217th official · 0% in top towns | A 883rd official · 62% in top towns |
| Cost of living | A 8719th official · 100% in top towns | A 9312th official · 100% in top towns | A+ 969th official · 100% in top towns | A+ 984th official · 100% in top towns |
| Health | D 89th official · 0% in top towns | D− 111th official · 0% in top towns | C− 188th official · 0% in top towns | B− 521st official · 0% in top towns |
| Jobs & income | B 6338th official | C 2649th official | B 6151st official | A+ 9514th official |
| Getting about | D 694th official · 0% in top towns | D 1089th official · 0% in top towns | D 792nd official · 0% in top towns | D− 397th official · 0% in top towns |
| Flood risk | Not graded | Not graded | Not graded | Not graded |
| Growth | D 1287th official | C 2873rd official | C 3171st official | B+ 7231st official |
Each cell: the subject’s grade and score, the county’s rank on the official figure (1st = the better end), and the share of its town residents living in a top-quarter town for the UK. Neighbour names open their report cards.
How this report card works
Two measures, side by side. The left card is an official figure for the whole county, its towns, villages and countryside together, built from the small areas and councils that make it up and ranked against the other counties. The right card is built from our town grades: of everyone living in the county’s graded towns of 2,500 or more, the share whose town is in the top quarter for the UK. Quarters are of people, not towns: the top quarter is the best-placed towns that together hold a quarter of everyone living in graded towns, so a county of big cities is not marked down just for being urban. A county can do well on one measure and not the other; that difference is often the story.
Scores and grades. Each subject’s score (0–100) is the area’s standing in one UK league of 98: the ceremonial counties of England (London counts as one), Wales’s eight preserved counties, and Scotland’s 32 and Northern Ireland’s 11 council areas, each called by its own name. The two measures’ percentiles are averaged, then ranked again, the same method as our town grades. Where a nation publishes its own kind of figure, the official figure is ranked within that nation: school results everywhere, health in Scotland and Northern Ireland, and flood risk in Scotland. Each area’s figures are set beside its own nation’s. 100 is the best county, 0 the last. Letters use the town-grade scale (A+ from 95, A from 85, A− from 75 … D below 15). The overall score weighs safety 18, cost of living 18, schools 16, health 14, jobs & income 12, getting about 8, growth 8, flood risk 6 (out of 100), over the subjects a county has. Counties with fewer than 5 graded towns (Rutland, Bristol) are graded on the official figures alone.
What it is not. A county figure averages everyone, so it cannot show whether a county is evenly good or a mix of very good and struggling places. The town measure shows the mix but leaves out villages and towns under 2,500. Neither says anything about any one street.
Gaps. Wales publishes no school results that compare with England’s, so Welsh counties have no Schools grade. Greater Manchester Police publishes no street-level crime, so Greater Manchester has no Safety grade and, as for its towns, no overall grade. Nor does Police Scotland, so Scotland’s council areas have no Safety grade or overall grade yet. Scotland and Northern Ireland have no small-area income figures, so their household income is estimated from ONS household income per head. Flood risk has no county-wide official figure; it is the share of homes in the county’s towns at high or medium risk. Sources are named under each figure. How grades work
Sources: 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.