Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
A town of 9,117 in Scottish Borders, Scotland.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Peebles has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below. Its strongest subject is walkability (A+): 30% of commuters walk, cycle or take public transport. Its weakest is hazard risk (D): 8.1% of homes at high or medium risk of flooding from rivers or the sea. The median home sold for £247,300 in the last three years, 5.6 times what households in the Scottish Borders council area earn in a year.
The 3 things Peebles 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 Peebles is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Peebles has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 152 buildings inside Peebles’s locality, 3 of them in the top category, and 3 scheduled monuments.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Peebles.
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 33% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
Working mainly from home: 33% of workers, higher than both Scottish Borders’ towns (28%) and Scotland’s towns (31%). The car carried 69% of commuters at the census. Of the commuters living in Peebles, 40% work in the town itself. Among 16 to 64s, 2.3% claimed unemployment benefits in 2026.
Scotland’s Census 2022 (NRS), method of travel and distance to work · DWP claimant count · OGL
Some 1,976 pupils attend Peebles’s three primaries and one secondary. Peebles High School’s results beat 79% of schools in Scotland like it. Below are two of its 4 schools, each with why it was picked.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Priorsford Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 328 | – |
| Peebles High SchoolLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 1,274 | A− |
Private tenants account for 11% of households. Social housing holds 19% of households, lower than both Scottish Borders’ towns (27%) and Scotland’s towns (24%). Households that own their home make up 69%.
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.
The heritage lists give each building’s grade but not its age, so we don’t say which is oldest.
For its size, Peebles has 167 listed buildings per 10,000 residents. Its listed buildings include High Street, Chambers Institution, Category A. At the top of the list, 3 are Category A and 61 Category B.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
Disability touches 21% of Peebles’ population. Peebles’ share in bad or very bad health, 4.7%, is the lowest of the 11 towns in Scottish Borders. Life expectancy here is 85.3 for women and 80.1 for men (2020–24).
| Census 2022 | Peebles | Scottish Borders | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 83% | 78% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 4.7% | 6.4% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 21% | 25% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL · Read these answers with age in mind: they aren’t adjusted, so younger places do better. The Health Grade uses age-adjusted measures, life expectancy and early deaths among them.
Just over a quarter of residents are 65 or over, about level with Scottish Borders’ towns (26%) and above Scotland’s towns (19%). Young adults of 15 to 24 are nearly a tenth of the population. At 49.4, the median resident of Peebles sits in the middle of the age range. The under-15s are 16% of the population here.
53% women, 47% men
About 90 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.
| Peebles | Scottish Borders | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 16% | 15% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 8.4% | 10% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 20% | 21% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 30% | 28% | 27% |
| 65+ | 26% | 26% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 14% | 20% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 7% | 9.3% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 11% | 11% | 11% |
| Degree level | 42% | 26% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · Scottish Borders and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Peebles. Best known first.
CastleVenlaw Castlein town
CastleNeidpath Castle300 m outside town, to the west
CastleHorsburgh Castle1.9 km outside town, to the east
GardenKailzie Gardens1.7 km outside town, to the southeast
CastleCardrona Tower3.8 km outside town, to the southeastMuseumMuseumPeebles Museum and Galleryin townPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
152 listed buildings in Peebles, 3 of them in the top category.
High Street, Chambers Institution: Photo: Jim Barton · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Crosskirk, church and friary, Peebles: Photo: Otter · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Eastgate and Venlaw Road, Green Tree Inn: Photo: Victuallers · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Old Town, Former Hay Lodge Stables, With Boundary Wall: Photo: Victuallers · CC BY-SA 4.0
32 notable people were born in Peebles.
Eric Bogle: XIIIfromTOKYO, CC BY-SA 4.0 · William Douglas, 4th Duke of Queensberry: John Opie, Public domain · William Chambers: Ad Meskens, CC BY-SA 3.0 · William Graham: Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire), Public domain · Finlay Christie: Stefano Delfrate, CC BY-SA 2.0
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Peebles | 9,117 | — | — | A | — | B |
| Innerleithen | 3,152 | 5.6 | — | 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 6.8 times the typical town in England and Wales for its size. Its Category A buildings include High Street, Chambers Institution. It also has 3 scheduled monuments.
Surface water isn’t included. Check a specific address on GOV.UK’s flood risk service.
Band D council tax in Peebles is £1,619 for 2026–27, less than in 95% of UK towns (council, county, police and fire). Your own bill depends on your home’s band; check it on GOV.UK.
GCSE results beat 82% of towns in England (Department for Education, Attainment 8).
Town in Scottish Borders, Scotland
Peebles is a locality of 9,117 people, in the Scottish Borders 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.