Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Council tax at Band D comes to £1,574. A large town in Fife, Scotland, home to 51,135 people.
Cost of living is its strong suit: a typical home costs £134,600 and rent runs £868 a month. It is easy to get around without a car (B+): on the way to work, 19% walk, cycle or take a bus or train. Where it falls short is health: life expectancy is 75.4 for men and 80.4 for women. Schools lag (C−): school leavers’ results beat 15% of Scottish towns.
Figures: prices, HM Land Registry, the last three years · commuting, Census 2022 · life expectancy, ONS. Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Kirkcaldy and Dysart has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Every other subject still has a grade below.
The 3 things Kirkcaldy and Dysart 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 Kirkcaldy and Dysart is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Kirkcaldy and Dysart has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Every other subject still has a grade below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 284 buildings inside Kirkcaldy and Dysart’s locality, 10 of them in the top category, and 2 scheduled monuments.
The archive holds 1 old photo or postcard going back to 1911.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Kirkcaldy and Dysart.
The social rented sector houses 27% of households. Owners make up nearly three in five households, about level with Scotland’s towns (60%) and below Fife’s towns (63%). 12% of households rent privately.
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 17 schools, two are shown below, each with the reason. Kirkcaldy and Dysart’s 12 primaries and four secondaries have 8,435 pupils between them.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capshard Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 508 | – |
| Balwearie High SchoolLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 1,574 | C+ |
A disability affects 27% of people in Kirkcaldy and Dysart. Self-reported good health: 77% of the town’s residents. 7.7% of residents described their health as bad or very bad, higher than both Fife’s towns (7.2%) and Scotland’s towns (7.2%).
| Census 2022 | Kirkcaldy and Dysart | Fife | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 77% | 77% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 7.7% | 7.2% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 27% | 26% | 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; 28% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
45% of commuters travelled under 5 km to work. The car took nearly four in five commuters, about level with Fife’s towns (78%) and above Scotland’s towns (70%). Kirkcaldy and Dysart counts 1 jobs per working resident.
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.
Of Kirkcaldy and Dysart’s land, 4% lies in conservation areas, above both Fife’s towns (0%) and Scotland’s towns (1%). Its listed buildings include Commercial Street and Bogies Wynd, Feuars Arms, Category A. For its size, Kirkcaldy and Dysart has 56 listed buildings per 10,000 residents.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
21% of residents have reached 65. Children under 15 make up 16%, near Fife’s towns (16%) and higher than Scotland’s towns (15%). At 43.9, the median resident of Kirkcaldy and Dysart sits in the middle of the age range. Among adults, 26% have a degree.
52% women, 48% men
About 94 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| Kirkcaldy and Dysart | Fife | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 16% | 16% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 11% | 13% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 25% | 24% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 28% | 27% | 27% |
| 65+ | 21% | 20% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 19% | 17% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 8.4% | 8.2% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 9.9% | 12% | 11% |
| Degree level | 26% | 27% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · Fife and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Kirkcaldy and Dysart. Best known first.
Castle · Historic Environment ScotlandRavenscraig Castlein townMuseumMuseumKirkcaldy Museum and Art Galleryin townMuseumMuseumAdam Smith Heritage Centrein townMuseumMuseumCoastal Centre Exhibitionin townAttractionAttractionThe Ecology Centre2.1 km outside town, to the southMuseumMuseumWemyss Cave Museum & Visitor Centre3.4 km outside town, to the northeastPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
284 listed buildings in Kirkcaldy and Dysart, 10 of them in the top category.
Ravenscraig Castle: Photo: Ian Mitchell · CC BY-SA 2.0 · 339-343 (Odd Nos) High Street with Boundary Walls: Photo: AlasdairW · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dysart,St Serf's Kirk: Photo: FHL2 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dysart Harbour: Photo: FHL2 · CC BY-SA 4.0
192 notable people were born in Kirkcaldy and Dysart.
Adam Smith: Etching created by Cadell and Davies (1811), John Horsburgh (1828) or R.C. Bell (1872)., Public domain · Robert Adam: Attributed to George Willison, Public domain · Guy Berryman: Raph_PH, CC BY 2.0 · Sandford Fleming: John Wycliffe Lowes Forster (1850-1938), Public domain · Val McDermid: Marlene Landu, CC BY-SA 4.0 · Oliver Burke: Nottingham Forest F.C., CC0
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kirkcaldy and Dysart | 51,135 | — | — | A | — | D |
| Cardenden and Auchterderran | 5,266 | 3.7 | — | A | — | D− |
| Kinghorn | 2,944 | 3.7 | — | A | — | C |
| Burntisland | 6,259 | 4.9 | — | A | — | D |
| Glenrothes | 37,466 | 4.9 | — | A | — | D |
| Lochgelly | 7,157 | 5.5 | — | A | — | D− |
| Leslie | 2,888 | 5.7 | — | A | — | D |
| Buckhaven | 4,413 | 6.2 | — | 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.
That is 2.3 times the typical town in England and Wales for its size. Its Category A buildings include Commercial Street and Bogies Wynd, Feuars Arms. It also has 2 scheduled monuments.
Homes cost less than in most UK towns: the median sale over three years was £134,600, against £277,000 in the typical town in England and Wales. On cost of living it is the 149th most affordable of 296 Scottish towns.
Band D council tax in Kirkcaldy and Dysart is £1,574 for 2026–27, less than in 97% 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 Fife, Scotland
Kirkcaldy and Dysart is a locality of 51,135 people, in the Fife 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.