Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
A town of 9,290 in Moray, Scotland.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Forres has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below. Its strongest subject is cost of living (A): the 179th most affordable of 296 Scottish towns: median sale £174,600, 4 years of area income; rent £816 a month. Its weakest is health (C−): life expectancy 79.1 for men, 80.1 for women.
The 3 things Forres 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 Forres is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Forres has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 171 buildings inside Forres’s locality, 4 of them in the top category, and 1 scheduled monument.
Explore the history →Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Forres. Best known first.
Castle · National Trust for ScotlandBrodie Castle4.2 km outside town, to the west
Abbey or prioryKinloss Abbey2.4 km outside town, to the northeast
CastleDarnaway Castle3.8 km outside town, to the southwest
CastleBlervie Castle1.4 km outside town, to the eastAttractionAttractionBenromach Distilleryin townPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Forres.
Forres is the second most expensive of the 5 towns in Moray, at £174,600. 11% rent privately, below both Moray’s towns (13%) and Scotland’s towns (13%).
Registers of Scotland data-zone sale prices · Scottish Government council tax · Scotland’s Census 2022 tenure · OGL
Two of its 4 schools are below, each with why it’s listed. The grade uses the secondaries its children go to; Scotland publishes no primary results by school.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Anderson's Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 263 | – |
| Forres AcademyLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 860 | C |
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 25% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
For Forres, that is above both Moray’s towns (2.8%) and Scotland’s towns (2.8%). For 40% of commuters, work was under 5 km away.
Scotland’s Census 2022 (NRS), method of travel and distance to work · DWP claimant count · OGL
Women here live to 80.1 on average and men to 79.1 (2020–24). Of the 5 towns in Moray, Forres has the second-largest share in bad or very bad health: 6%. At the census, 26% of people here had a disability, above both Moray’s towns (23%) and Scotland’s towns (24%).
| Census 2022 | Forres | Moray | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 78% | 80% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 6% | 5.9% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 26% | 23% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL
The heritage lists give each building’s grade but not its age, so we don’t say which is oldest.
Forres sits above both Moray’s towns (68) and Scotland’s towns (22) on this measure. Forres’s listed buildings include Findhorn Viaduct, Category A.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
That puts Forres above both Moray’s towns (22%) and Scotland’s towns (19%). Under-15s account for 13% of the population. Half the people of Forres are older than 50.5.
51% women, 49% men
About 95 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| Forres | Moray | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 13% | 16% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 9% | 9.8% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 21% | 25% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 29% | 27% | 27% |
| 65+ | 27% | 22% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 18% | 18% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 8.1% | 10% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 12% | 11% | 11% |
| Degree level | 28% | 24% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · Moray and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
171 listed buildings in Forres, 4 of them in the top category.
High Street, Tolbooth: Photo: Craig Williams · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Victoria Road, St John's Episcopal Church: Photo: David Bremner · CC BY-SA 2.0 · 29 Caroline Street, The Castle: Photo: Richard Webb · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Geograph · Waterford Road, Benromach Distillery, Maltbarn: Photo: Peter Moore · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Geograph
23 notable people were born in Forres.
Shirley Henderson: nicolas genin, CC BY-SA 2.0 · Sir Donald Stewart, 1st Baronet: Elliott & Fry, Public domain · Francis Jenkinson: John Singer Sargent, Public domain · James Fraser: Australian Government, Public domain
The nearest towns and villages, from National Records of Scotland’s 2022 localities. See them on the map →
That is 7.6 times the typical town in England and Wales for its size. Its Category A buildings include Findhorn Viaduct. It also has 1 scheduled monument.
Homes cost less than in most UK towns: the median sale over three years was £174,600, against £277,000 in the typical town in England and Wales. On cost of living it is the 179th most affordable of 296 Scottish towns.
Town in Moray, Scotland
Forres is a locality of 9,290 people, in the Moray 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.