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The quintain on the village green at OffhamPhoto: Marathon · CC BY-SA 2.0
–Not graded
Work & commute in Offham · ONS, DWP · claims to August 2026

A place people come to for work: Offham has 1.8 jobs per resident in work

20% of residents who travel to work go less than 3 miles. Every working day, 83 residents go out to work, and 50 people come the other way. The Jobs & income Grade leaves out Offham.

What stands out · In brief

Where Offham stands out on work

Longer journeys to work

Against 45% across England’s towns. 4% of commuters walk to work (11% across England’s towns). Getting to work ↓

Fewer benefit claims than most towns

The typical UK town: 2.7%; England and Wales: 4% so far in 2026. Claims across the Tonbridge and Malling council area have run below the national rate every month since 2015. Benefits over time ↓

Written from the data on this page: ONS Census 2021 and BRES, DWP claimant counts via Nomis, and ONS household income.

Jobs based here

388 jobs, one in four in hotels, pubs and restaurants

The six biggest kinds of work
50Restaurants, cafés and pubs23% of jobs · England 6%3.7× England’s share
10Building trades7% of jobs · England 3%2.7× England’s share
10Shops6% of jobs · England 8%
10Education6% of jobs · England 9%
10Legal and accounting5% of jobs · England 3%1.6× England’s share
10Public administration and defence5% of jobs · England 5%
Share of jobs by industry England’s towns
Hotels, pubs and restaurants24%
Construction11%
Professional, scientific and technical10%
Business administration and support10%
Retail6%
Education5%
Health and social care5%
Arts, leisure and other services5%
Public administration and defence5%
Manufacturing4%

BRES counts jobs, not people (a part-time job and a second job count once each), so it runs above the Census count of people working here (175). Small areas are shared out to the town by where their Census 2021 workers were based; kinds of work are BRES industry divisions (SIC 2007), rounded. England’s towns: all jobs in its built-up areas.

Jobs at workplaces in Offham (employees and working owners, ONS Business Register and Employment Survey 2024).

Getting to work

For 12% of Offham’s commuters, the trip is on foot, by bike, bus or train

Median journey 12.9 km; typical UK town 8.4 km.

Drive78%Kent 70% · England 64%
Passenger4%Kent 6% · England 6%
Walk4%Kent 11% · England 11%
Cycle3%Kent 2% · England 3%
Bus0.9%Kent 3% · England 6%
Train4%Kent 5% · England 3%
Other5%Kent 3% · England 6%
OffhamKent’s townsEngland’s towns
How far they travel England’s towns
6%
Under 2 km
14%
2–5 km
19%
5–10 km
41%
10–20 km
7%
20–30 km
7%
30–40 km
4%
40–60 km
2%
60 km +

ONS Census 2021, TS061 (method of travel) and TS058 (distance, straight line from home to workplace), output areas summed. Census day fell in the third lockdown, so fewer people travelled than usual.

How residents who travel to work get there, and how far they go (Census 2021, not counting those working mainly at home).

Benefits over time

Jobless claims in the Tonbridge and Malling council area have run below England and Wales every month since 2015

0%2%4%6%201520172019202120232025First lockdownCensus dayEngland & Wales 4%South East 3.1%Tonbridge and M… 2.5%
Tonbridge and Malling (council area)South EastEngland and Wales

Tonbridge and Malling’s rate was about 1.2% in 2019, peaked at 4.4% in May 2020 and has averaged 2.5% in 2026, against 4% across England and Wales. Claims everywhere stay higher than before the pandemic, partly because Universal Credit counts more people on low pay as looking for work.

Claimant rate
1.8%
of 16 to 64s in the built-up area, January to August 2026
5 people in August 2026 · typical UK town 2.7%
Employment deprivation
5.3%
of 18 to 66s out of work through unemployment, sickness, disability or caring
IoD 2025
Income deprivation
6.5%
of residents in low-income households on means-tested benefits
In the most deprived tenth
0%
of residents live in England’s most employment-deprived 10% of areas

The chart is the whole council area of Tonbridge and Malling, which Nomis publishes monthly; the figures above the line are for Offham’s built-up area. Claimant count: people claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance, or Universal Credit while required to look for work. Employment deprivation counts people out of work on Jobseeker’s Allowance, Employment and Support Allowance, Incapacity Benefit, Severe Disablement Allowance, Carer’s Allowance or the Universal Credit equivalents (English Indices of Deprivation 2025). The “most deprived tenth” compares areas within England only.

Claimant rate since 2015: people claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance or Universal Credit while looking for work, as a share of residents aged 16 to 64 (DWP, via Nomis).

The daily tide

Offham empties a little on a working day

210 residents were in work at the 2021 Census; 175 people worked in Offham.

Live in Offham210 in work
83127
Work in Offham175 people
50125
Commute in · 50Commute out · 83Live and work here · 0At home or no fixed place · 125

For every person who comes in to work, about 2 residents travel out.

The middle of each bar is the same people: residents who work in the village or from home.

On the map

Offham’s commuters work from Maidstone to Sevenoaks

Snodland: 7 commute inSnodlandMaidstone: 9 residents work thereSevenoaks: 9 residents work thereTonbridge: 5 residents work thereChatham: 5 residents work thereMaidstoneSevenoaksTonbridgeChathamOffham2 miles
Grey dots: where people live (Census 2021). Places drawn centre to centre; flows under 5 people are listed, not drawn.

100% of residents who travel to a workplace work outside Offham; Maidstone takes the most (9). Coming the other way, Snodland sends the most (7).

The ten places that send the most workers into Offham, and the ten where its residents most often work (Census 2021, by home and workplace). Line width is the number of people.

Household income

Households in Offham average £68,444 a year

Higher than 86% of UK towns of 2,500+; the typical town is £52,385. The whole council area of Tonbridge and Malling averages £66,819.

Offham £68KTypical UK town £52K
£50K£55K£60K£65K£70K

The town figure is ONS’s neighbourhood (MSOA) estimates shared out by where the town’s residents live.

Total household income before tax, mean, year to March 2023 (ONS small-area estimates).

What residents do

37% of adults in Offham are retired

Offham
51%37%
England’s towns
56%21%
In workStudents in workUnemployedStudentsRetiredLong-term sick or disabledLooking after home or familyOther
Residents in work, by occupation points above or below England’s towns
Managers, directors and senior officials23%+10.2
Professional occupations23%+2.8
Associate professional and technical occupations15%+1.8
Administrative and secretarial occupations12%+3
Skilled trades occupations8%−1.9
Caring, leisure and other service occupations5%−4.2
Sales and customer service occupations5%−2.4
Process, plant and machine operatives4%−3.3
Elementary occupations5%−5.9

ONS Census 2021, tables TS066 (economic activity) and TS063 (occupation), output areas summed to the built-up area. England’s towns: everyone living in its built-up areas.

Everyone 16 and over, by what they were doing the week before the 2021 Census, and the jobs of those in work.

Neighbours

Jobs and income in the places around Offham

TownPeopleJobsWork in own townClaimantsGrade
Offham460388—1.8%—
West Malling4,2511,5967%2.6%B+
Kings Hill9,96310,37913%1.9%A+
Vigo Village2,0051755%1.4%A−
Borough Green4,7121,68410%2.4%A−
Larkfield26,14715,27517%2.7%B+
Wrotham1,9611,0005%2.4%B−
Wateringbury2,2486123%2.2%A

Jobs based in each place, commuters who stay in their own town, and the claimant rate.

How to read these numbers

What this data can and can’t tell you

  • The Census was taken in lockdown. Census day was 21 March 2021, during the third national lockdown: many people were furloughed or working from home, so fewer travelled to work, and journeys were shorter, than before the pandemic or since. The flows on this page show where people worked that spring.
  • At home and no fixed place are one figure. In the workplace flows, ONS puts people who mainly worked at home and people with no fixed workplace (drivers, builders, care workers on rounds) at their home address, so the two can’t be told apart there.
  • Towns are built-up areas. Offham here is ONS’s built-up area: the town as built, not its council district. A workplace on an estate or farm outside every built-up area counts as “outside any built-up area”.
  • Jobs are counted where they are. BRES counts jobs at each workplace (employees and working owners, rounded by ONS), so a town with a hospital, university or big employer can have more jobs than working residents. Small areas are shared out to towns by where their Census workers were based.
  • The benefits chart is the council area. Nomis publishes the claimant count monthly for councils back to 2013, so the line is Tonbridge and Malling as a whole; the claimant rate elsewhere on this page is Offham’s built-up area, from small areas.

Questions about work in Offham

How many people commute into Offham?

50 people who lived elsewhere worked in Offham at the 2021 Census, 29% of its 175 workers. The most came from Snodland (7), Chatham (4) and Tonbridge (3). 83 residents travelled out the other way.

How many jobs are there in Offham?

About 390 jobs (employees and working owners) were based in Offham in 2024, on ONS’s Business Register and Employment Survey: 1.8 for every resident in work, against 0.7 in the typical UK town. The biggest kinds of work are restaurants, cafés and pubs (about 50), building trades (about 10) and shops (about 10).

How do people in Offham get to work?

82% of commuters go by car or van, 4% walk, 3% cycle and 5% take the bus or train; 20% travel under 5 km. Census 2021, taken during lockdown.

What is the average household income in Offham?

Mean household income before tax was £68,444 in the year to March 2023 (ONS), against £52,385 in the typical UK town.

Sources: ONS Census 2021 origin-destination data, place of work (ODWP01EW), output areas summed to the ONS 2022 built-up area · ONS Census 2021 tables TS058 (distance), TS061 (method of travel), TS063 (occupation) and TS066 (economic activity) · ONS Business Register and Employment Survey via Nomis (open access), by industry division · ONS small-area income estimates (financial year ending 2023); House of Commons Library MSOA names · DWP claimant count via Nomis (towns January to August 2026; councils, regions and England and Wales monthly since January 2015) · MHCLG English Indices of Deprivation 2025 · DfT Transport Connectivity Metric (employment) · 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.