Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Council tax at Band D comes to £1,717. Population 3,701: a town in East Ayrshire, Scotland.
Darvel’s strongest subject is cost of living — the median home sold for £112,400, 2.6 years of area income. Health lags: life expectancy is 75.7 for men and 81.2 for women. Schools lag: school leavers’ results beat just over a quarter of Scottish towns. It lags on walkability as well — just over one in ten commuters get to work on foot, by bike or by public transport.
Figures: prices, HM Land Registry, the last three years · life expectancy, ONS · commuting, Census 2022. Police Scotland publishes no street-level crime, which leaves Darvel without a Safety Grade or an overall grade. Every other subject still has a grade below.
Each subject compared with the 2,160 UK towns with an overall grade (schools within Scotland), ordered by how far Darvel is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Police Scotland publishes no street-level crime, which leaves Darvel without a Safety Grade or an overall grade. Every other subject still has a grade below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
The 3 things Darvel does most differently from other towns.
Historic Environment Scotland lists 16 buildings inside Darvel’s locality, 14 of them in the second category.
Explore the history →16 listed buildings in Darvel.
Darvel Church: Photo: Gareth Fitzpatrick · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Nos. 6, 7, 8 and 9 Hastings Square: Photo: Gareth Fitzpatrick · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 10 12 West Main Street Darvel Town Hall and Library: Photo: Leslie Barrie · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Row of Cottages, Priestland - (Pal Myra) (Roseside) (Lynedoch): Photo: Alan Reid · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Geograph
Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Darvel.
16% live in social housing, below East Ayrshire’s towns (26%) and Scotland’s towns (24%) alike. Renting privately is how one in ten households live. Private rents average £656 a month across the Ayrshires 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.
Its only school is listed below. The town’s primary school has 245 pupils.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Darvel Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 245 | – |
A disability affects 28% of people in Darvel. 75% of the town’s residents described their health as good or very good at the census, near East Ayrshire’s towns (76%) and lower than Scotland’s towns (78%). Poor health, by residents’ own account, affects nearly a tenth of the town.
| Census 2022 | Darvel | East Ayrshire | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 75% | 76% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 8.3% | 8.1% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 28% | 27% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL · Young towns look healthier on these answers, which aren’t adjusted for age; the Health Grade uses measures that are, such as life expectancy and early deaths.
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 25% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
Working from home was the norm for a quarter of workers at the census. Short trips to work, under 5 km: 15%, below both East Ayrshire’s towns (35%) and Scotland’s towns (44%). At the census, 12% of commuters got to work without a car. Work in town: 6% of resident commuters.
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.
Historic Environment Scotland’s list names 16 listed buildings in Darvel: 14 Category B. Listed buildings per head: 43 for every 10,000 residents of the town.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
Typical age in Darvel: 50.8, the median. Graduates make up 26% of adults.
51% women, 49% men
About 95 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| Darvel | East Ayrshire | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 15% | 16% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 8.8% | 10% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 19% | 24% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 30% | 29% | 27% |
| 65+ | 27% | 21% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 19% | 22% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 9.7% | 8.7% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 11% | 10% | 11% |
| Degree level | 26% | 23% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · East Ayrshire and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Darvel. Best known first.
CastleLoudoun Castle4.8 km outside town, to the west
CastleNewmilns Tower1.7 km outside town, to the westFortFortCarnals Castle2.3 km outside town, to the northFortFortCastle Hill900 m outside town, to the westFortFortJudge's Hill3.7 km outside town, to the westPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
15 notable people were born in Darvel.
Allan Gilliland: © 2001 Edmonton Symphony Society, CC BY-SA 3.0 · Jennifer George: Cs-wolves, CC BY-SA 4.0 · John Morton Boyd: I.l.boyd, CC BY-SA 4.0
Town in East Ayrshire, Scotland
Darvel is a locality of 3,701 people, in the East Ayrshire 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
The nearest towns and villages, from National Records of Scotland’s 2022 localities. See them on the map →
| Town | People | Miles | Overall | Cost | Safety | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Darvel | 3,701 | — | — | A+ | — | D |
| Newmilns | 2,559 | 1.9 | — | A+ | — | D− |
| Galston | 4,527 | 4 | — | A+ | — | C− |
| Hurlford and Crookedholm | 4,360 | 6.8 | — | A+ | — | D− |
| Mauchline | 3,809 | 7.6 | — | A+ | — | D |
| Kilmarnock | 47,073 | 8.3 | — | A+ | — | D |
| Eaglesham | 3,475 | 8.9 | — | A | — | B− |
| Strathaven | 8,341 | 9.6 | — | A | — | C+ |
No Scottish town has a Safety Grade or an overall grade yet: Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime. People: Census 2022. Miles: centre to centre.
Homes cost less than in most UK towns: the median sale over three years was £112,400, against £277,000 in the typical town in England and Wales. On cost of living it is the 22nd most affordable of 296 Scottish towns.
GCSE results trail 74% of towns in England (Department for Education, Attainment 8). One state school is inside the town; places are handled by the local council.
Band D council tax in Darvel is £1,717 for 2026–27, less than in 88% of UK towns (council, county, police and fire). Your own bill depends on your home’s band; check it on GOV.UK.
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.