How TownRatings grades UK towns

Every grade in the UK edition comes from public data, compares a town only with other towns in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and is turned into a letter the same way. This page explains how, once, so each town page can stay about the town. American towns are graded separately, in their own edition.

From numbers to letters

A town is an ONS built-up area (2022), the continuous built-up land around a place, not a council area; in Northern Ireland, a NISRA settlement (the 2015 Settlement Development Limits). For each subject we rank every UK town with 1,000 or more residents (Census 2021) on the public data behind it. A town’s percentile is the share of those towns it does better than. Where a subject has several measures, each is ranked, the ranks are averaged, and the average is ranked again. The percentile becomes a letter on one fixed scale:

Bottom 5% · then steps of 10% · top 5%. There is no F: a D− town is still a real place where people live and make it work.

Each town also shows its rank within its ceremonial county (London’s boroughs rank within London; Northern Ireland’s towns within their council area, one of its 11 local government districts), because the national letter and the local picture can differ. A county with fewer than five graded towns gets no county rank; Northern Ireland’s towns also show their rank among Northern Ireland’s towns.

The overall grade

The overall grade blends the livability subjects: cost of living 18, safety 18, schools 16, health 14, jobs and income 12, walkability 8 and flood risk 4. The blend is ranked again across the UK, so an A means the same share of towns everywhere. A town needs 2,500 residents, a Safety Grade, at least three of cost, safety, schools and health, and at least five of the seven subjects. A subject a town has no grade for is left out of its blend, and the other subjects’ weights are scaled up to fill it. History, the outdoors and civic life are graded too, as character, but they don’t count toward the overall grade.

Population is one figure everywhere: the town’s Census 2021 count.

Safety

Crimes recorded by the police inside the town’s boundary, from police.uk’s street-level data (the Police Service of Northern Ireland publishes there too), averaged over the latest three years and counted per 1,000 residents a year. The grade counts crimes against residents and their homes: violent and sexual offences (police.uk’s “violence and sexual offences”, robbery and possession of weapons), burglary, vehicle crime, and criminal damage and arson. Each counts once. Shoplifting, theft from the person, bicycle theft, other theft and anti-social behaviour are shown on each Safety page but not graded, because they follow shops, stations and night-time streets more than where people live.

police.uk’s violence and sexual offences is far broader than American “violent crime”: it includes harassment, stalking and assault without injury. Rates on town pages are labelled with the three years they average; counts by type are for the latest 12 months.

Source: police.uk street-level crime, 36 months to August 2026. Locations are moved to the nearest of a set of anonymous points, so crimes near a town’s edge can fall either side of it.

Schools

England and Northern Ireland, each graded against its own towns only: the two nations set different exams. England: the state schools in the town, weighted by pupils: primary schools on Key Stage 2 reading, writing and maths (the share meeting the expected standard, averaged over three years), secondary schools on Attainment 8 and the share earning grade 5 or above in English and maths. Each result is measured against England’s schools, then the town’s schools are combined. A town with fewer than two schools of its own, or under 30 pupils in them, is graded on the schools within 3 km. Progress 8 isn’t used. Ofsted judgements are shown on each school’s page but not graded.

Northern Ireland: Northern Ireland towns’ School Grades use GCSE results (5 or more at A* to C, including English and maths) at every post-primary school in or within 10 km of the town, grammar and non-grammar, weighted by pupils, and rank them against Northern Ireland’s towns only. Northern Ireland publishes no primary school results. Northern Ireland selects at 11, so a grammar school’s pupils come from far beyond its own town; grading the schools a town’s children can reach, grammar and non-grammar together, means a town isn’t lifted just for hosting one. Where no grammar school is within 10 km, the nearest stands in for the share of pupils who go to one.

Sources: Department for Education performance tables (via Explore Education Statistics) and Get Information About Schools; Department of Education (Northern Ireland), examination performance at post-primary schools 2024/25.

Health

Every health measure allows for the town’s ages, so a seaside town of retired people isn’t marked down for being old. Every town, in England and in Wales, has ONS’s small-area figures for 2019 to 2023: life expectancy at birth and healthy life expectancy (the years expected in good or very good health) for men and for women, worked out from the death rate at each age. Every town also has two Census 2021 measures, the share in bad or very bad health and the share disabled, counted against what England and Wales’s rates by single year of age would give a town with these ages. In England the grade also uses OHID’s small-area figures: deaths under 75 and preventable deaths for 2019 to 2023 (against what England’s rates would give the same ages), emergency hospital admissions and Year 6 obesity. Two measures are needed for a grade.

Welsh towns’ Health Grades use 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’ also use OHID’s small-area early deaths, hospital admissions and child obesity, which OHID publishes for England only.

Northern Ireland towns’ Health Grades use NISRA’s life expectancy for 2022 to 2024 in the district electoral areas around the town, and two Census 2021 measures, bad health and disability, adjusted for age to the same standard as England and Wales. Healthy life expectancy isn’t published for Northern Ireland’s areas, and its early-death, hospital and child-obesity figures cover district electoral areas or council areas rather than small areas, so the Health page compares those with Northern Ireland without grading them.

Sources: ONS, health state life expectancy for middle-layer areas, England and Wales, 2019 to 2023 (July 2026); Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (Fingertips, middle-layer areas); ONS Census 2021; NISRA life expectancy by district electoral area (2022 to 2024) and NISRA Census 2021.

Cost of living

Three measures, each against the mean household income of the town’s council area: the median sale price (Land Registry, standard sales over three years), a year’s average private rent (ONS, by council), and the council’s Band D council tax including the parish precept. Area income is used, not the town’s own, so a wealthy town isn’t graded as cheap just because its residents earn a lot; pages show both, labelled. In North Yorkshire, Somerset, Cumberland and Westmorland and Furness, ONS publishes one rent for the whole former county, so towns there are graded on price and council tax. Two of the three are needed.

Northern Ireland has no council tax and no published rents for its council areas, so its towns are graded on two: NISRA’s ward median sale prices (2022 to 2024, brought to early-2025 prices) and the average domestic rates bill, compared as a Band D equivalent (the bill scaled by England and Wales’s ratio of Band D to the average council tax a home pays). Both are set against an estimate of the council area’s mean household income, from ONS’s disposable income per head and household size, because no small-area income figures exist there. Rates also pay for water, which homes in England and Wales pay for separately.

Sources: HM Land Registry Price Paid (September 2023 to August 2026); ONS Price Index of Private Rents; MHCLG and Welsh Government council tax, 2026–27; ONS small-area income estimates (financial year ending 2023); NISRA / Land & Property Services ward sale prices; Land & Property Services rates and Department of Finance poundages; ONS regional gross disposable household income.

Jobs and income

Four measures: mean household income; the share of 16 to 64s claiming unemployment-related benefits; employment deprivation (the share of working-age residents out of work through unemployment, sickness or caring, the same DWP definition in England and Wales); and how many jobs residents can reach, by the Department for Transport’s connectivity measure. Three of the four are needed. Northern Ireland publishes none of them for small areas, so its towns have no Jobs Grade.

Sources: ONS small-area income estimates; DWP claimant count (Nomis), January to August 2026; English Indices of Deprivation 2025 and Welsh Index of Multiple Deprivation 2025; DfT Transport Connectivity Metric 2025.

Walkability

The share of commuters who walked, cycled or took public transport to work at the 2021 Census, for towns with 200 or more commuters. The Census was taken in March 2021, during lockdown, when many people worked from home; it is the only count for every town, and each page says so.

Sources: ONS and NISRA Census 2021, method of travel to work.

Flood risk

The share of the town’s homes at high or medium risk of flooding from rivers or the sea. Surface water, radon and coastal erosion are shown on each Flood & hazards page but not graded. Lower risk grades higher. Northern Ireland’s flood maps aren’t open data, so its towns have no flood grade.

Sources: Environment Agency National Flood Risk Assessment (NaFRA2); Natural Resources Wales Flood Risk Assessment Wales; Ordnance Survey and ONS address and household counts.

History, outdoors and civic life

These three describe a town’s character. Each has a grade on its own page, but none counts toward the overall grade: a newer town isn’t a worse place to live for being new.

England and Wales only for now. History: protected heritage inside the town (Historic England and Cadw listed buildings, weighted Grade I three times, II* twice and II once, plus scheduled monuments, battlefields and registered parks and gardens), ranked both per resident and as a count, and the share of homes built before 1919. Heritage weighs twice as much as the old homes.

Outdoors: public green space per resident; the share of residents within 400 metres of a park or playing field; the share of land within 5 km that is a National Park or National Landscape; footpaths and rights of way per square kilometre; and the coast nearby. Three of the five are needed.

Civic life: local registered charities per 1,000 residents, and the share of residents within 1 km of a public library.

Sources: Historic England and Cadw; Valuation Office Agency; Ordnance Survey Open Greenspace; Natural England and Natural Resources Wales; OpenStreetMap; Charity Commission for England and Wales.

Wales

Welsh towns are graded on the same scale as English towns, with two differences. Wales publishes no school-level results comparable with England’s, so Welsh towns have no School Grade, and their overall grade blends the other six subjects. Health uses fewer measures, as described under Health.

Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland’s towns of 2,500 or more are graded on the same scale as English and Welsh towns, on five subjects: cost of living, safety, schools, health and walkability. There is no Jobs Grade and no flood grade (the data isn’t published), so their overall grade blends the five, which the five-of-seven rule allows. Schools are graded against Northern Ireland’s towns only, cost of living uses house prices and domestic rates, and health uses NISRA’s life expectancy and the Census, as described above. Every Northern Ireland town is among the UK’s most affordable on prices and rates against local incomes, so their Cost Grades sit close together; each Northern Ireland page also shows the town’s rank on cost among Northern Ireland’s towns.

Towns without a grade, and towns not ranked

• Towns under 2,500 residents get subject grades but no overall grade; under 1,000, no grades at all.
• Scotland’s 296 towns have pages, and grades for cost of living, schools, health, walkability and flood risk, but no Safety Grade: Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime for reuse. Without it they have no overall grade and aren’t ranked, until the 2026 Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation brings neighbourhood crime figures. Their schools and flood risk are graded against Scottish towns only, because Scotland’s exams and flood maps measure differently.
• Greater Manchester. Greater Manchester Police doesn’t publish street-level crime to police.uk, so its towns have no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Their other subjects are graded.
• Military garrisons and university campuses (where most workers serve in the armed forces on military land, or most residents are students) keep their grades but aren’t ranked against other towns or listed among the best places to live.

What the grades can’t tell you

• Bigger places record more crime per resident. Town and city centres draw people from far beyond their residents, so large towns grade lower on Safety than villages almost everywhere. Each Safety page also compares the town with towns of a similar size.
• Official data, as published. We use official figures as their agencies publish them and say where each comes from. When a police force published fewer months than the rest, the town’s page says so and its rate covers the months published.
• An average isn’t a street. A town’s grade averages neighbourhoods that can differ more than whole towns do; Safety and Health pages show them.
• Grades refresh when the data does.

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.