Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
The average domestic rates bill is £1,177 a year. 28,141 people live in this large town in Mid and East Antrim, Northern Ireland.
Low prices, and some weak spots to weigh against them. Its best grade is for cost of living (A+) — homes sell for a median £153,100, about 3.2 times local household income. At B overall, Carrickfergus is better than 63% of UK towns and ranks #6 of 8 in Mid and East Antrim and #45 of 63 in Northern Ireland. The catch is schools: GCSE results beat 8% of Northern Ireland towns. Health is weaker too (C−): life expectancy 79.8 for men, 83 for women.
Figures: prices, HM Land Registry (LPS), 2022 to 2024 at early-2025 prices · life expectancy, ONS.
This town's Cost Grade uses house prices and the domestic rates bill: Northern Ireland has no council tax, and no rents are published for its council areas. This town's Health Grade uses NISRA's life expectancy for its district electoral area (2022 to 2024) and two Census 2021 measures, bad health and disability, adjusted for age. Healthy life expectancy and the early-death and hospital measures English towns use aren't published for small areas in Northern Ireland. This town's School Grade uses GCSE results at the post-primary schools its children travel to, grammar and non-grammar, compared with schools across Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland publishes no primary school results. Northern Ireland has no Jobs Grade (no small-area income, claimant or job-access data is published) and no Hazards Grade (its flood maps aren't open data).
The 3 things Carrickfergus does most differently from other towns.
Each subject compared with the 2,160 UK towns with an overall grade (schools within Northern Ireland), ordered by how far Carrickfergus is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
How TownRatings grades towns →
The Historic Environment Division lists 37 buildings inside Carrickfergus’s settlement, 2 of them in the top grade, and 11 scheduled monuments.
The archive holds 1 old photo or postcard going back to 1888.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Carrickfergus.
15% live in social housing, below both Mid and East Antrim’s towns (16%) and Northern Ireland’s towns (20%). Carrickfergus is the second cheapest of the 8 towns in Mid and East Antrim, at £153,100.
NISRA / Land & Property Services ward sale prices and domestic rates · NISRA Census 2021 tenure · OGL · The figure is NISRA’s median sale price for the wards around Carrickfergus, 2022 to 2024, brought to early-2025 prices and weighted by sales.
Between them, ten primaries and three secondaries teach 4,696 pupils in Carrickfergus. Carrickfergus Grammar School’s results beat nearly nine in ten schools in Northern Ireland like it. Below are three of its 14 schools, each with why it was picked.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Victoria Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 445 | – |
| Carrickfergus AcademyLargest post-primary schoolPost-primary | Post-primary | 909 | D |
| Carrickfergus Grammar SchoolTop results in townPost-primary | Post-primary | 761 | A |
Three quarters of Carrickfergus’ residents described their health as good or very good at the census, below both Mid and East Antrim’s towns (76%) and Northern Ireland’s towns (77%). Of the 8 towns in Mid and East Antrim, Carrickfergus has the largest share in bad or very bad health: 9.1%. Women here live to 83 on average and men to 79.8 (2022–24).
| Census 2021 | Carrickfergus | Mid and East Antrim | Northern Ireland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 75% | 76% | 77% |
| Bad or very bad health | 9.1% | 8.3% | 8.7% |
| Disabled (Equality Act) | 29% | 27% | 26% |
NISRA Census 2021, general health and disability · NISRA life expectancy by district electoral area, 2022–24 · OGL · These shares come straight from the census, without allowing for age, and young towns benefit; the Health Grade instead weighs age-adjusted measures, including life expectancy.
Town centres with shops, stations and nightlife record more crime per resident: police.uk counts crimes where they happen, not where victims live.
Reported offences in Carrickfergus came to 976 over twelve months to August 2026; nuisance and anti-social incidents added 498. Homes saw 6.3 burglaries and acts of damage per 1,000 residents a year, above Mid and East Antrim’s towns (5.2) but below Northern Ireland’s towns (8.8). Nearly half of the crimes fell under violence and sexual offences.
Not gradedAnti-social behaviour, shoplifting and other theft are shown but left out of the Safety Grade, which counts violence and crimes against homes and vehicles per resident.
data.police.uk street-level crime · points inside the NISRA settlement boundary · OGL · The police category of violence and sexual offences includes harassment and stalking.
The heritage lists give each building’s grade but not its age, so we don’t say which is oldest.
Carrickfergus’s listed buildings include the Former Gasworks, Grade A. It has 13 listed buildings for every 10,000 residents, below both Mid and East Antrim’s towns (35) and Northern Ireland’s towns (34). The national list protects 11 ancient monuments here.
HED list, October 2026 · Valuation Office Agency, homes by build period · OGL
The Census was taken on 21 March 2021, in lockdown, so 17% of workers were mainly at home; shares here are of those who travelled.
By car: that was how 83% of commuters travelled at the census. Of the commuters living in Carrickfergus, 31% work in the town itself. 17% of workers did their job mainly from home at the census.
NISRA Census 2021, method of travel to work · OGL
20% of residents are 65 or over, near Mid and East Antrim’s towns (20%) and higher than Northern Ireland’s towns (17%). The median resident of Carrickfergus is 44.5 years old. Those aged 15 to 24 account for just over one in ten residents.
52% women, 48% men
About 94 men for every 100 women. Across Northern Ireland, 51% of residents are women.
| Carrickfergus | Mid and East Antrim | Northern Ireland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 16% | 17% | 19% |
| 15–24 | 11% | 11% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 24% | 25% | 27% |
| 45–64 | 30% | 28% | 26% |
| 65+ | 20% | 20% | 17% |
| No qualifications | 23% | 26% | 25% |
| A levels or similar | 17% | 16% | 16% |
| Degree level | 27% | 27% | 32% |
NISRA Census 2021 · Mid and East Antrim and Northern Ireland: all residents of their settlements · Women and men: whole data zones, which approximate the town’s boundary · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Carrickfergus. Best known first.
CastleCarrickfergus Castlein town
MuseumUS Rangers Centrein townMuseumMuseumCarrickfergus Museumin townZooZooKilcreggan Urban Farmin townCastleCastleCastle Chester3.3 km outside town, to the northeastMuseumMuseumRailway Preservation Society of Ireland3.4 km outside town, to the northeastPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
37 listed buildings in Carrickfergus, 2 of them Grade I.
St. Nicholas' Church of Ireland Church: Photo: StephencampbelL · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Carrickfergus Borough Council: Photo: Ardfern · CC BY-SA 3.0
35 notable people were born in Carrickfergus.
Robert Adrain: Attribution Charles Cromwell Ingham, 1796 - 1863 Former attribution John Vanderlyn, 15 Oct 1775 - 23 Sep 1852, Public domain · Charlotte Riddell: Elliott & Fry photograph, by courtesy of Jennifer Carnell, Public domain · Roy Taylor: Duncan.Hull, CC BY-SA 4.0 · Jackie Woodburne: 5 albert square, CC BY-SA 4.0 · David Hilditch: Northern Ireland Assembly, CC BY 4.0
The nearest settlements, from NISRA’s 2015 boundaries. See them on the map →
| Town | People | Miles | Overall | Cost | Safety | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Carrickfergus | 28,141 | — | B | A+ | B+ | C− |
| Greenisland | 5,383 | 3.2 | A− | A+ | A− | C+ |
| Whitehead | 3,537 | 4.3 | B+ | A+ | B+ | C− |
| Holywood | 10,757 | 6.2 | A | A | B+ | C+ |
| Metropolitan Newtownabbey | 67,599 | 6.3 | B+ | A+ | B | C− |
| Bangor | 64,596 | 7.8 | B+ | A+ | B+ | C |
| Ballyclare | 10,850 | 8 | B | A+ | A− | C− |
| Larne | 18,853 | 9 | B | A+ | C+ | C− |
People: Census 2021. Miles: centre to centre.
Northern Ireland publishes no primary results. 3 post-primary schools are inside the town; places are handled by the Education Authority.
Homes cost less than in most UK towns: the median sale in 2022 to 2024, at early-2025 prices, was £153,100, against £277,000 in the typical UK town. On cost of living it is the 12th most affordable of 63 Northern Ireland towns.
Northern Ireland has no council tax: homes pay domestic rates, set on the home’s capital value, and the rates also pay for water. The average bill in Mid and East Antrim is about £1,177 a year for 2026–27, against England’s average council tax per home of £1,868. Your own bill depends on your home’s value; check it with Land & Property Services on nidirect.
Large town in Mid and East Antrim, Northern Ireland
Carrickfergus is a settlement of 28,141 people, in the Mid and East Antrim council area. TownRatings uses NISRA’s settlements (the 2015 Settlement Development Limits) as Northern Ireland’s towns: the physical town, as people mean the word, rather than a council district, so its figures cover the town itself.
Built from NISRA geography and Census 2021
Sources: NISRA Census 2021, data zones best-fitted to the NISRA Settlement Development Limits 2015 (settlement totals from NISRA where it publishes them) · NISRA / Land & Property Services verified residential sales by ward, 2005 to 2024, new and existing dwellings (medians; the 2022 to 2024 headline brought to early-2025 prices with the LPS house price index, which runs to 2026) · Land & Property Services domestic rates paid by council, 2025-26, and Department of Finance rate poundages 2026-27 · data.police.uk street-level crime (Police Service of Northern Ireland), 36 months to August 2026, points inside the settlement boundary · NISRA life expectancy by district electoral area (2022 to 2024) and NISRA Census 2021 general health and disability, adjusted for age · ONS gross disposable household income by council (2022), scaled to household income on England and Wales’s councils · Department of Education examination performance at post-primary schools 2024/25 and school-level enrolment data 2025/26 · 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.
