Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
A large town of 47,073 in East Ayrshire, Scotland.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Kilmarnock has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below. Its strongest subject is cost of living (A+): the 22nd most affordable of 296 Scottish towns: median sale £115,900, 2.7 years of area income; rent £656 a month. Its weakest is health (D): life expectancy 75.8 for men, 79.5 for women.
The 3 things Kilmarnock 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 Kilmarnock is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Kilmarnock has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 173 buildings inside Kilmarnock’s locality, 4 of them in the top category.
The archive holds 3 old photos and postcards going back to 1890.
Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Kilmarnock.
The estimated median sale price is £116K, close to East Ayrshire’s towns (£100K) and below Scotland’s towns (£174K).
Registers of Scotland data-zone sale prices · Scottish Government council tax · Scotland’s Census 2022 tenure · OGL
Two of its 17 schools are below, each with why it’s listed. The grade uses the secondaries its children go to; Scotland publishes no primary results by school.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Onthank Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 552 | – |
| Grange AcademyLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 1,312 | C+ |
Women here live to 79.5 on average and men to 75.8 (2020–24). These answers aren’t adjusted for age, so young towns look healthier; the Health Grade uses age-adjusted measures, including life expectancy and early deaths.
| Census 2022 | Kilmarnock | East Ayrshire | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 77% | 76% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 7.7% | 8.1% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 26% | 27% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 26% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
80% of commuters drove, below East Ayrshire’s towns (82%) but above Scotland’s towns (70%). For 45% of commuters, work was under 5 km away.
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.
Kilmarnock has 173 listed buildings inside its locality on Historic Environment Scotland’s list: 4 Category A, 82 Category B.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
In the comparison, Kilmarnock comes above both East Ayrshire’s towns (16%) and Scotland’s towns (15%). The median resident of Kilmarnock is 42.5 years old. People aged 15 to 24 make up 11% of the town.
52% women, 48% men
About 93 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| Kilmarnock | East Ayrshire | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 17% | 16% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 11% | 10% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 26% | 24% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 28% | 29% | 27% |
| 65+ | 19% | 21% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 21% | 22% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 8% | 8.7% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 11% | 10% | 11% |
| Degree level | 24% | 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 Kilmarnock. Best known first.
MuseumDick Institutein town
CastleDean Castle200 m outside town, to the northeast
CastleCaprington Castle600 m outside town, to the southwest
CastleDundonald Castle4.3 km outside town, to the southwest
CastleRowallan Castle1.1 km outside town, to the north
CastleCraufurdland Castle1 km outside town, to the northeastPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
173 listed buildings in Kilmarnock, 4 of them in the top category.
Bank Street, The Laigh Kirk: Photo: Billy McCrorie · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Green Street, Palace Theatre, Former Corn Exchange: Photo: M J Richardson · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Kilmarnock Railway Station: Photo: Geof Sheppard · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 15 Strand Street, Formerly Part of Hays and Goldberg's Warehouse: Photo: Clareleethompson · CC BY-SA 4.0
155 notable people were born in Kilmarnock.
Jim Brown: Robyburns, CC BY-SA 4.0 · Colin Mochrie: Colin_Mochrie_at_BANFF,_2008.jpg: kris krüg derivative work: Keraunoscopia, CC BY-SA 3.0 · James McDougal Hart: George G. Rockwood, Public domain · William McIlvanney: nonsenseferret, CC BY-SA 3.0 · Steven Cree: JackieM8, CC BY-SA 4.0
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kilmarnock | 47,073 | — | — | A+ | — | D |
| Hurlford and Crookedholm | 4,360 | 1.8 | — | A+ | — | D− |
| Crosshouse | 2,609 | 2.2 | — | A+ | — | D− |
| Kilmaurs | 2,702 | 2.2 | — | A+ | — | D |
| Galston | 4,527 | 4.4 | — | A+ | — | C− |
| Dundonald | 2,579 | 4.7 | — | A | — | C− |
| Stewarton | 7,870 | 4.8 | — | A+ | — | C |
| Dreghorn | 3,362 | 5 | — | A+ | — | D |
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 £115,900, 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.
Surface water isn’t included. Check a specific address on GOV.UK’s flood risk service.
Band D council tax in Kilmarnock 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.
Large town in East Ayrshire, Scotland
Kilmarnock is a locality of 47,073 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
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.