Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
The town has 3,405 residents and lies in West Lothian, Scotland. Council tax at Band D comes to £1,628.
West Calder’s strongest is schools: school leavers’ results beat 99% of Scottish towns. Prices are modest for what you get: a typical home costs £237,400 and rent runs £908 a month. Health is its weak spot: men here can expect to live to 77.2, women to 78.6. Natural hazards weigh less here than in most UK towns (A−): 0.1% of homes at high or medium risk of flooding from rivers or the sea.
Figures: prices, HM Land Registry, the last three years · life expectancy, ONS · flood risk, SEPA. West Calder has no Safety Grade, because Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, and so no overall grade. The other subjects are graded below.
The 3 things West Calder 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 West Calder is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
West Calder has no Safety Grade, because Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, and so no overall grade. The other subjects are graded below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 4 buildings inside West Calder’s locality, 3 of them in the second category, and 1 scheduled monument.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in West Calder.
West Calder High School’s results beat 96% of schools in Scotland like it. Its two schools are below. Some 1,638 pupils attend the town’s one primary and one secondary.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parkhead Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 393 | – |
| West Calder High SchoolLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 1,245 | A+ |
Disability touches a quarter of West Calder’s population. 78% of people in West Calder rate their own health good or very good. At the census, 7.5% of residents said their health was bad or very bad, above West Lothian’s towns (7%) and close to Scotland’s towns (7.2%).
| Census 2022 | West Calder | West Lothian | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 78% | 79% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 7.5% | 7% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 25% | 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.
13% rent privately, between West Lothian’s towns (9%) and Scotland’s towns (13%). Behind the median of £237,400: 259 sales in West Calder’s data zones, 2023 to 2025. Council and housing-body homes hold just over a fifth 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.
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 35% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
35% of workers worked mainly from home, above West Lothian’s towns (33%) and Scotland’s towns (31%) alike. There are 0.6 jobs in West Calder for each resident in work. Of the commuters living locally, 7% work in the town itself.
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.
West Calder has one scheduled monument. Scaled to its population, that is 12 listed buildings for every 10,000 people in the town.
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
Children under 15 make up 15%, below West Lothian’s towns (18%) and close to Scotland’s towns (15%). West Calder has a median age of 45.9 years. The share aged 15 to 24 is 11%.
51% women, 49% men
About 95 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| West Calder | West Lothian | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 15% | 18% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 11% | 11% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 23% | 26% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 29% | 29% | 27% |
| 65+ | 22% | 17% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 17% | 16% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 7.9% | 7.3% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 12% | 11% | 11% |
| Degree level | 28% | 28% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · West Lothian and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near West Calder. Best known first.
17 notable people were born in West Calder.
Tommy Davidson: Thebees1889, CC BY-SA 4.0
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| West Calder | 3,405 | — | — | A | — | D |
| Polbeth | 2,595 | 1 | — | A | — | D− |
| Blackburn | 5,263 | 2.6 | — | A | — | D− |
| Livingston | 55,798 | 3.5 | — | A | — | D |
| Mid Calder | 3,217 | 4.1 | — | A | — | B |
| Bathgate | 22,229 | 4.1 | — | A+ | — | C− |
| Whitburn | 11,772 | 4.7 | — | A+ | — | D− |
| East Calder | 7,249 | 5.4 | — | B | — | 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.
GCSE results beat 99% of towns in England (Department for Education, Attainment 8). West Calder has 2 state schools; places are handled by the local council.
Band D council tax in West Calder is £1,628 for 2026–27, less than in 94% of UK towns (council, county, police and fire). Your own bill depends on your home’s band; check it on GOV.UK.
Surface water isn’t included. Check a specific address on GOV.UK’s flood risk service.
Town in West Lothian, Scotland
West Calder is a locality of 3,405 people, in the West Lothian 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.