Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Home to 5,459 people, this town lies in East Renfrewshire, Scotland. 40% of households own their home outright.
Neilston’s strongest is cost of living (A): homes sell for a median £189,800, about 3.2 times local household income. Pupils here do better than most: school leavers’ results beat 84% of Scottish towns. Residents’ health trails most towns (C+): men here can expect to live to 78.9, women to 85.3. A Band D home pays £1,620 in council tax.
Figures: prices, HM Land Registry, the last three years · life expectancy, ONS. Police Scotland publishes no street-level crime, which leaves Neilston without a Safety Grade or an overall grade. Every other subject still has a grade below.
The 3 things Neilston 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 Neilston is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Police Scotland publishes no street-level crime, which leaves Neilston without a Safety Grade or an overall grade. Every other subject still has a grade below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 2 buildings inside Neilston’s locality, 2 of them in the second category.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Neilston.
Owners make up three quarters of households, below East Renfrewshire’s towns (82%) but above Scotland’s towns (60%). Social housing holds 18% of households. Neilston is the second cheapest of the 10 towns in East Renfrewshire, at £189,800.
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.
Of its 2 schools, one is shown below, with the reason. Between them, two primaries teach 469 pupils in Neilston.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neilston Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 319 | – |
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 32% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
A fifth of commuters walked, cycled or took the bus or train at the census, between East Renfrewshire’s towns (18%) and Scotland’s towns (27%). The car carried nearly four in five commuters at the census. Among 16 to 64s, 2.1% claimed unemployment benefits in 2026.
Scotland’s Census 2022 (NRS), method of travel and distance to work · DWP claimant count · OGL
Just over a fifth of residents have a disability, higher than East Renfrewshire’s towns (20%) yet lower than Scotland’s towns (24%). Women here live to 85.3 on average and men to 78.9 (2020–24).
| Census 2022 | Neilston | East Renfrewshire | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 81% | 83% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 6% | 5.3% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 22% | 20% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL · A young population flatters these answers, which are not age-adjusted; the Health Grade instead uses measures that allow for age, such as life expectancy and early deaths.
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 holds 2 listed buildings inside its locality: 2 Category B.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
Half of Neilston is older than 43.1, half younger. Children under 15 count for 16% of the people here. People 65 and over make up 21% of the town, near East Renfrewshire’s towns (22%) and higher than Scotland’s towns (19%).
53% women, 47% men
About 90 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| Neilston | East Renfrewshire | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 16% | 18% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 12% | 11% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 24% | 21% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 27% | 28% | 27% |
| 65+ | 21% | 22% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 16% | 12% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 9.6% | 6% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 13% | 12% | 11% |
| Degree level | 29% | 44% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · East Renfrewshire and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Neilston. Best known first.
MuseumGlasgow Museums Resource Centre4 km outside town, to the northeastMuseumMuseumThe Open Museum4 km outside town, to the northeastCastleCastlePatterton Tower5 km outside town, to the eastPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
8 notable people were born in Neilston.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Neilston | 5,459 | — | — | A | — | C+ |
| Barrhead | 17,608 | 1.8 | — | A | — | D |
| Newton Mearns | 28,447 | 3.8 | — | B+ | — | A− |
| Paisley | 79,351 | 3.8 | — | A | — | D− |
| Elderslie | 5,632 | 4.1 | — | A− | — | D |
| Thornliebank | 4,084 | 4.6 | — | A | — | C− |
| Johnstone | 16,477 | 4.7 | — | A | — | D− |
| Giffnock | 11,963 | 5.4 | — | B+ | — | B+ |
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.
Band D council tax in Neilston is £1,620 for 2026–27, less than in 94% of UK towns (council, county, police and fire). Your own bill depends on your home’s band; check it on GOV.UK.
GCSE results beat 84% of towns in England (Department for Education, Attainment 8). Neilston has 2 state schools; places are handled by the local council.
Homes cost less than in most UK towns: the median sale over three years was £189,800, against £277,000 in the typical town in England and Wales. On cost of living it is the 121st most affordable of 296 Scottish towns.
Town in East Renfrewshire, Scotland
Neilston is a locality of 5,459 people, in the East Renfrewshire 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.