Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Home to 9,439 people, this town lies in Perth and Kinross, Scotland. Band D council tax is £1,674.
Where it does best is cost of living (A+): a typical home costs £205,700 and rent runs £760 a month. Schools are its weak spot: school leavers’ results beat 17% of Scottish towns. It lags on health as well: life expectancy 77.4 for men, 82 for women. 109 listed buildings, 3 of them in the top category.
Figures: prices, HM Land Registry, the last three years · life expectancy, ONS. Without street-level crime figures from Police Scotland, Blairgowrie has no Safety Grade, and so no overall grade. The other subjects are graded below.
The 3 things Blairgowrie 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 Blairgowrie is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Without street-level crime figures from Police Scotland, Blairgowrie has no Safety Grade, and so no overall grade. The other subjects are graded below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 109 buildings inside Blairgowrie’s locality, 3 of them in the top category.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Blairgowrie.
Owners make up just over two thirds of households, higher than both Perth and Kinross’ towns (62%) and Scotland’s towns (60%). Behind the median of £205,700: 622 sales in Blairgowrie’s data zones, 2023 to 2025. Social housing holds 19% of households.
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.
Some 1,627 pupils attend Blairgowrie’s three primaries and one secondary. Two of its 4 schools are below, each with the reason it’s listed.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Newhill Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 385 | – |
| Blairgowrie High SchoolLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 930 | C− |
Children under 15 make up 14%, about level with Perth and Kinross’ towns (15%) and below Scotland’s towns (15%). Young adults of 15 to 24 are 8.8% of the population. Typical age in Blairgowrie: 50.3, the median.
52% women, 48% men
About 91 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women. Women live longer than men, so towns with many older residents have more women.
| Blairgowrie | Perth and Kinross | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 14% | 15% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 8.8% | 10% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 21% | 24% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 26% | 27% | 27% |
| 65+ | 30% | 24% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 18% | 16% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 8.8% | 7.9% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 11% | 11% | 11% |
| Degree level | 31% | 33% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · Perth and Kinross and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
At the census, 27% of people here had a disability, higher than both Perth and Kinross’ towns (24%) and Scotland’s towns (24%). Of the 8 towns in Perth and Kinross, Blairgowrie has the largest share in bad or very bad health: 7.3%. Self-reported good health: 77% of the town’s residents.
| Census 2022 | Blairgowrie | Perth and Kinross | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 77% | 80% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 7.3% | 6% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 27% | 24% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL · These answers aren’t adjusted for age, so young towns look healthier; the Health Grade uses age-adjusted measures, including 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.
43% of commuters travelled under 5 km to work. The car took 77% of commuters, above both Perth and Kinross’ towns (71%) and Scotland’s towns (70%). Unemployment benefit claims reached 3% of 16 to 64s in 2026. About 35% of its commuters stay in Blairgowrie for work.
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.
Blairgowrie’s listed buildings include Newton Street, Newton Castle, Category A. Of the town’s land, 8% lies in conservation areas, above both Perth and Kinross’ towns (7%) and Scotland’s towns (1%). At the top of the list, 3 are Category A and 46 Category B.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
109 listed buildings in Blairgowrie, 3 of them in the top category.
Rattray (New), Balmoral Road, Keathbank Mill: Photo: James Nicol · CC BY-SA 2.0 · 53 Allan Street, Royal Hotel: Photo: Jonathan Thacker · CC BY-SA 2.0 · 46 Leslie Street, Council Offices: Photo: Richard Sutcliffe · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Geograph · Rattray (New), Boat Brae, Riverside Methodist Church Including Church Hall, Boundary Walls, Railings and Gates: Photo: Alpin Stewart · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Geograph
17 notable people were born in Blairgowrie.
Alexander Macfarlane: J. M. Colaw, Public domain · Andy Clyde: CBS Television, Public domain · George Spalding: An Illustrated Congressional Manual. The United States Red Book, 1896, (detail), Collection of U.S. House of Representatives, Public domain · William Macpherson: Xherring (Uploads), Public domain
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Blairgowrie | 9,439 | — | — | A+ | — | C− |
| Scone | 5,219 | 12 | — | A | — | C+ |
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 4.7 times the typical town in England and Wales for its size. Its Category A buildings include Newton Street, Newton Castle.
Band D council tax in Blairgowrie is £1,674 for 2026–27, less than in 92% of UK towns (council, county, police and fire). Your own bill depends on your home’s band; check it on GOV.UK.
GCSE results trail 83% of towns in England (Department for Education, Attainment 8).
Town in Perth and Kinross, Scotland
Blairgowrie is a locality of 9,439 people, in the Perth and Kinross 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.