Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
A town of 3,767 in Dyfed, Wales.
Cardigan grades D overall against UK towns: better than 6% of UK towns. Its strongest subject is walkability (A): 28% of commuters walk, cycle or take public transport. Its weakest is jobs & income (D−): mean household income £37,886; 4.8% of 16 to 64s claim unemployment benefits. The median home sold for £225,000 in the last three years, 5.2 times what households in the Ceredigion council area earn in a year.
Dyfed Powys Police published 32 of the 36 months; rates are per year over the months published. This town's Health Grade uses ONS's small-area life expectancy and healthy life expectancy for 2019 to 2023, and two Census 2021 measures, bad health and disability, adjusted for age. English towns' grades also use OHID's small-area early deaths, hospital admissions and child obesity, which OHID publishes for England only.
The 3 things Cardigan does most differently from other towns.
Each subject compared with the 2,160 UK towns with an overall grade (schools within Wales), ordered by how far Cardigan is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Cadw lists 95 buildings inside Cardigan’s built-up area, 1 of them Grade I, and 3 scheduled monuments.
29% of its homes were built before 1919, against 15% in the typical UK town.
The archive holds 5 old photos and postcards going back to 1741 and a map from 1834.
Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Cardigan.
For Cardigan, that is above both Dyfed’s towns (38.9) and Wales’s towns (33.8). Burglary and damage come to 20.1 per 1,000 residents a year. Police recorded 485 crimes inside Cardigan’s built-up area in the 12 months to August 2026, plus 42 reports of anti-social behaviour.
Not gradedAnti-social behaviour, shoplifting and other theft are shown but left out of the Safety Grade, which counts violence and crimes against homes and vehicles per resident.
data.police.uk street-level crime · points inside the ONS built-up-area boundary · OGL
Its two schools are below. Wales publishes no school-level results, so its schools have no letters.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ysgol Gynradd AberteifiLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 379 | – |
| Ysgol Uwchradd AberteifiLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 614 | – |
The heritage lists give each building’s grade but not its age, so we don’t say which is oldest.
Cardigan sits above both Dyfed’s towns (32) and Wales’s towns (18) on this measure. Cardigan’s listed buildings include Cardigan Castle, Grade I. Cardigan has 95 listed buildings on Cadw’s list: 1 Grade I, 8 Grade II*.
Cadw list, October 2026 · Valuation Office Agency, homes by build period · OGL
The Census was taken on 21 March 2021, in lockdown, so 20% of workers were mainly at home; shares here are of those who travelled.
That puts Cardigan below both Dyfed’s towns (83%) and Wales’s towns (81%). For 58% of commuters, work was under 5 km away.
ONS Census 2021, method of travel and distance to work · ONS small-area income · DWP claimant count · OGL
On this, Cardigan is above both Dyfed’s towns (23%) and Wales’s towns (22%). Women here live to 81.9 on average and men to 77.6 (2019–23). These answers aren’t adjusted for age, so young towns look healthier; the Health Grade uses age-adjusted measures, including life expectancy.
| Census 2021 | Cardigan | Dyfed | Wales |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 73% | 77% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 9% | 7.4% | 7.1% |
| Disabled (Equality Act) | 27% | 23% | 22% |
ONS Census 2021, general health and disability · ONS, life expectancy 2019–23 · OGL
In the comparison, Cardigan comes above both Dyfed’s towns (17%) and Wales’s towns (18%). Owners make up 52% of households.
| By type | Median | Sales |
|---|---|---|
| Detached | £310,000 | 45 |
| Semi-detached | £217,500 | 42 |
| Terraced | £190,000 | 41 |
HM Land Registry Price Paid · ONS private rents · MHCLG / Welsh Government council tax · ONS Census 2021 tenure · OGL
People aged 15 to 24 make up 10% of the town, below both Dyfed’s towns (12%) and Wales’s towns (12%). Half the people of Cardigan are older than 47.
52% women, 48% men
About 92 men for every 100 women. Across Wales, 51% of residents are women. Women live longer than men, so towns with many older residents have more women.
| Cardigan | Dyfed | Wales | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 17% | 16% | 17% |
| 15–24 | 10% | 12% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 21% | 22% | 25% |
| 45–64 | 25% | 26% | 26% |
| 65+ | 27% | 24% | 21% |
| No qualifications | 22% | 19% | 20% |
| Apprenticeship | 6.1% | 6.1% | 5.6% |
| A levels or similar | 16% | 18% | 17% |
| Degree level | 27% | 30% | 31% |
ONS Census 2021 · Dyfed and Wales: all residents of their built-up areas · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Cardigan. Best known first.
CastleCardigan Castlein town
Castle · CadwCastell Cilgerran / Cilgeran Castle2.6 km outside town, to the southeast
Abbey or priory · CadwSt Dogmaels Abbey700 m outside town, to the westArt galleryArt galleryVlad-Art Galleryin townMuseumMuseumCastle Green Housein townAttractionAttractionRussian Cannonin townPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
95 listed buildings in Cardigan, 1 of them Grade I.
Cardigan Castle: Photo: Llywelyn2000 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Bethania Baptist Chapel: Photo: Reading Tom from Reading, UK · CC BY 2.0 · Parish Church of St Mary: Photo: Llywelyn2000 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Bridge Warehouse: Photo: Hywel72 · CC BY-SA 3.0
15 notable people were born in Cardigan.
Phoebe Davies: The New York Star, Public domain · Charles Symmons: William Beechey, CC0 · David R Edwards: GanMed64, CC BY 2.0
The nearest built-up areas, from ONS’s 2022 boundaries. See them on the map →
| Town | People | Miles | Overall | Cost | Safety | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cardigan | 3,767 | — | D | B− | D− | D |
| St Dogmaels | 1,013 | 1.1 | — | B | B− | B− |
| Aberporth | 1,075 | 5.8 | — | C+ | C− | C− |
| Newcastle Emlyn | 1,842 | 8.6 | — | B+ | D | C |
St Dogmaels, Aberporth and Newcastle Emlyn have fewer than 2,500 residents, so they get subject grades but no overall grade. People: Census 2021. Miles: centre to centre.
It has more crime per resident than most places its size: 98% of the 1,308 UK towns of 2,500 to 10,000 people report less. Police recorded 485 crimes inside Cardigan’s built-up area in the 12 months to August 2026, 51% of them violence and sexual offences, a police category that includes harassment and stalking.
95 on Cadw’s list, 1 of them Grade I and 8 Grade II*. That is 10.3 times the typical UK town for its size. Its Grade I building is Cardigan Castle. It also has 3 scheduled monuments.
Surface water isn’t included. Check a specific address on Natural Resources Wales’s flood risk service.
Town in Dyfed, Wales
Cardigan is a built-up area of 3,767 people, in the Ceredigion council area. TownRatings uses ONS’s 2022 built-up areas as towns: the physical town, as people mean the word, rather than a council district, so its figures cover the town itself.
Built from ONS geography and Census 2021
Sources: ONS Census 2021, output areas summed to the ONS 2022 built-up area · HM Land Registry Price Paid (standard sales, September 2023 to August 2026) · ONS Price Index of Private Rents (August 2026, by council) · MHCLG and Welsh Government council tax, Band D 2026–27 (with parish precepts in England) · data.police.uk street-level crime, 36 months to August 2026, points inside the built-up-area boundary · ONS small-area life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, 2019 to 2023 (England and Wales), OHID Fingertips small-area indicators (England) and Census 2021 health, adjusted for age · ONS small-area income estimates (financial year ending 2023) · DWP claimant count via Nomis (January to August 2026) · Cadw listed buildings, scheduled monuments and registered historic parks and gardens via DataMapWales, October 2026, inside the ONS 2022 built-up-area boundary · Valuation Office Agency, Council Tax: stock of properties by build period (31 March 2025) · 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.