Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Private rents average £621 a month. The town has 2,620 residents and lies in Powys, Wales.
Some subjects shine; others lag. Builth Wells grades C overall, better than 29% of UK towns. It ranks #3 of 7 in Powys. Where it falls short is jobs & income: mean household income £38,894; 2.7% of 16 to 64s claim unemployment benefits. Police record more crime here than in most towns (C−): police record 41.8 violent and sexual offences per 1,000 residents a year, and 12 home and vehicle crimes. Against UK towns of 2,500 to 10,000 people, it has more crime per resident than 86%. A median £246,000 buys a home here, 5.8 times what households in the Powys council area earn in a year. Its best grade is for walkability — on the way to work, 21% walk, cycle or take a bus or train.
Figures: commuting, Census 2021 · income, ONS · claimants, DWP · crime, police.uk, averaged Sep 2023 to Aug 2026 · prices, HM Land Registry, the last three years.
Dyfed Powys Police published 32 of the 36 months; rates are per year over the months published. This town's Health Grade uses 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' grades also use OHID's small-area early deaths, hospital admissions and child obesity, which OHID publishes for England only.
The 3 things Builth Wells does most differently from other towns.
Each subject compared with the 2,160 UK towns with an overall grade (schools within Wales), ordered by how far Builth Wells is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Cadw lists 44 buildings inside Builth Wells’s built-up area, and 1 scheduled monument.
42% of its homes were built before 1919, against 15% in the typical UK town.
The archive holds 8 old photos and postcards going back to 1910.
Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Builth Wells.
The heritage lists give each building’s grade but not its age, so we don’t say which is oldest.
Just over two fifths of its homes were built before 1919, higher than both Powys’ towns (32%) and Wales’s towns (27%). Relative to its size, Builth Wells keeps 168 listed buildings per 10,000 residents. The national list protects one ancient monument locally.
Cadw list, October 2026 · Valuation Office Agency, homes by build period · OGL
All of them are below. Builth Wells’s one primary and one secondary have 1,186 pupils between them.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Builth Wells C.P. SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 238 | – |
| Ysgol Calon CymruLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 948 | – |
Police figures for Builth Wells’s built-up area: 196 crimes and 28 anti-social behaviour reports in the 12 months to August 2026. Violence and sexual offences were 60% of the crimes.
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 ONS built-up-area boundary · OGL · The police category of violence and sexual offences includes harassment and stalking.
The Census was taken on 21 March 2021, in lockdown, so 25% of workers were mainly at home; shares here are of those who travelled.
At the census, 76% of commuters went by car. About 23% of its commuters stay in Builth Wells for work. Jobs per working resident: 0.6.
ONS Census 2021, method of travel and distance to work · ONS small-area income · DWP claimant count · OGL
One GP practice serves the town. 5.5% of residents described their health as bad or very bad, below Powys’ towns (6.5%) and Wales’s towns (7.1%) alike. A disability affects 20% of people in Builth Wells.
| Census 2021 | Builth Wells | Powys | Wales |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 78% | 78% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 5.5% | 6.5% | 7.1% |
| Disabled (Equality Act) | 20% | 22% | 22% |
ONS Census 2021, general health and disability · ONS, life expectancy 2019–23 · OGL · No age adjustment applies to these census answers, which flatter younger towns; the Health Grade’s measures, life expectancy among them, do allow for age.
Only one of the 7 towns in Powys costs more to buy into than Builth Wells, whose median sale is £246,000. Council and housing-body homes hold 12% of households. 101 standard sales inside the town’s built-up area from September 2023 to August 2026 put the median at £246,000.
| By type | Median | Sales |
|---|---|---|
| Detached | £300,000 | 42 |
| Semi-detached | £240,000 | 27 |
| Terraced | £175,500 | 28 |
HM Land Registry Price Paid · ONS private rents · MHCLG / Welsh Government council tax · ONS Census 2021 tenure · OGL
Under 15: 15% of residents. Young adults of 15 to 24 are one in ten residents, higher than Powys’ towns (9.5%) yet lower than Wales’s towns (12%). Residents of Builth Wells have a median age of 47.1.
52% women, 48% men
About 94 men for every 100 women. Across Wales, 51% of residents are women. Women live longer than men, so towns with many older residents have more women.
| Builth Wells | Powys | Wales | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 15% | 15% | 17% |
| 15–24 | 10% | 9.5% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 22% | 21% | 25% |
| 45–64 | 27% | 27% | 26% |
| 65+ | 26% | 27% | 21% |
| No qualifications | 19% | 20% | 20% |
| Apprenticeship | 5.6% | 6.2% | 5.6% |
| A levels or similar | 19% | 17% | 17% |
| Degree level | 29% | 30% | 31% |
ONS Census 2021 · Powys and Wales: all residents of their built-up areas · OGL
44 listed buildings in Builth Wells.
Builth Castle: Photo: Eirian Evans · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Lion Hotel: Photo: Aderixon · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Post Office: Photo: Aderixon · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Cosy Corner Tea Rooms: Photo: peter robinson · CC BY-SA 2.0
The nearest built-up areas, from ONS’s 2022 boundaries. See them on the map →
| Town | People | Miles | Overall | Cost | Safety | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Builth Wells | 2,620 | — | C | B− | C− | C+ |
| Llandrindod Wells | 5,429 | 6.6 | C− | B+ | D− | C− |
| Rhayader | 1,837 | 12 | — | A− | D | C− |
Rhayader has fewer than 2,500 residents, so it gets subject grades but no overall grade. People: Census 2021. Miles: centre to centre.
44 on Cadw’s list. That is 6.9 times the typical UK town for its size. It also has 1 scheduled monument.
Surface water isn’t included. Check a specific address on Natural Resources Wales’s flood risk service.
Town in Powys, Wales
Builth Wells is a built-up area of 2,620 people, in the Powys council area. TownRatings uses ONS’s 2022 built-up areas as towns: the physical town, as people mean the word, rather than a council district, so its figures cover the town itself.
Built from ONS geography and Census 2021
Sources: ONS Census 2021, output areas summed to the ONS 2022 built-up area · HM Land Registry Price Paid (standard sales, September 2023 to August 2026) · ONS Price Index of Private Rents (August 2026, by council) · MHCLG and Welsh Government council tax, Band D 2026–27 (with parish precepts in England) · data.police.uk street-level crime, 36 months to August 2026, points inside the built-up-area boundary · ONS small-area life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, 2019 to 2023 (England and Wales), OHID Fingertips small-area indicators (England) and Census 2021 health, adjusted for age · ONS small-area income estimates (financial year ending 2023) · DWP claimant count via Nomis (January to August 2026) · Cadw listed buildings, scheduled monuments and registered historic parks and gardens via DataMapWales, October 2026, inside the ONS 2022 built-up-area boundary · Valuation Office Agency, Council Tax: stock of properties by build period (31 March 2025) · 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.