About us
About BestPlaceUK.
We score 335 UK councils, 700+ towns and 2,500 postcode districts across nine dimensions that shape daily life. The data is all official, the method is all published, and we don't sell leads.
A move that should have been easier.
Deciding where to live in the UK means juggling dozens of factors that nobody publishes in one place: flood risk, Ofsted ratings, crime per 1,000, broadband speeds, rainfall, commute times, GP access, noise, air quality. Each sits behind a different government portal, in a different format, at a different geography.
Most of what shows up on a Google search is either property listings dressed up as advice, ten-year-old "best towns" rankings, or London-centric round-ups that ignore 95% of the country. We built BestPlaceUK so you don't have to stitch it together yourself.
The gap
What we set out to fix.
Five problems we kept running into when researching our own moves.
Too much noise, too little signal
Property portals optimise for listings, not liveability. We wanted the numbers that matter, not another gallery of kitchens.
Outdated "best town" rankings
The guides that rank highest in search were often written years ago. House prices and crime patterns change. Our data refreshes monthly.
One UK, wildly different places
A "great commuter town" in Surrey means nothing if you're moving to Tyneside. We score every area against UK-wide benchmarks and let you filter by region.
Research takes weeks
ONS, Ofsted, Police UK, Met Office, DEFRA, NHS: 20+ publishers, all different. We do the joining so you can compare ten shortlisted areas in an afternoon.
Generic rankings miss you
A young renter, a growing family and a downsizer want different things. Find My Match lets you weight the nine dimensions by what actually matters to you.
No skin in the sale
We don't list properties, take commission, or sell leads. That frees us to show the honest picture, including the scores nobody moving there wants to see.
"Anyone moving home in the UK deserves to feel genuinely informed about where they're going, before they sign the contract."
The principle we build to
Principles
How we build every area profile.
Data over opinion
Every score traces back to a named public dataset: ONS, Land Registry, Ofsted, NHS, Met Office, Police UK. No surveys, no anecdotes, no editorial "vibes".
Personal over generic
The headline score is a transparent equal-weight average. Find My Match lets you reweight the nine dimensions around your priorities: schools, affordability, commute, whatever matters.
Honest about limits
Where a metric is a proxy, or inherited from a parent council, or based on open-source data that has gaps, we say so on the page. No fake precision.
Built for the UK
All 335 Local Authority Districts, 700+ towns, and roughly 2,500 postcode districts across England, Scotland and Wales, not just the usual twenty headline cities.
Who it's for
Anyone making a move in the UK.
Different priorities, same need for a clear picture.
The relocator
Moving for work or to be nearer family and need to learn a new region fast.
The growing family
Weighing schools, safety and green space against budget and commute.
The first-time buyer
Stretching a deposit as far as it will go without compromising daily life.
The returner
Coming back from abroad and re-orienting to a UK that has changed since you left.
The downsizer
Retiring or right-sizing, with health access, walkability and climate in mind.
The undecided
Open to anywhere in Britain, and wanting the data to narrow it down.
How it works
Nine dimensions, one score.
Every area is scored 0–100 on each dimension, normalised against UK-wide 5th and 95th percentile benchmarks, then averaged for an overall score.
- Affordability: house prices relative to local earnings
- Safety: Home Office, Police UK and Scottish Government crime data
- Weather: Met Office sunshine, rainfall and temperature averages
- Green space: access to parks and natural environments
- Amenities: shops, restaurants, healthcare, leisure
- Commute: travel times and public transport access
- Education: Ofsted ratings and childcare quality
- Environment: air quality, flood risk, noise exposure
- Health & wellbeing: GP access, life satisfaction, self-reported health
Full details of how each score is calculated live on the methodology page.
Provenance
90+ official UK data sources.
BestPlaceUK draws on data from the Office for National Statistics, HM Land Registry, the Home Office, Police UK, the Met Office, Ofsted, the NHS, Ofcom, the Department for Transport, Natural England, the Environment Agency and more, all used under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Mapping and amenity data come from OpenStreetMap under the Open Data Commons Open Database License (ODbL).
A note on using the scores
BestPlaceUK is an informational tool, not professional advice. Scores are indicative and shouldn't be the sole basis for deciding where to live. Visit in person, speak to people who live there, and consult qualified professionals for financial, legal or conveyancing decisions. See our disclaimer for the detail.
Make your next move with confidence.
Tell us what matters to you, and we'll rank every UK area around your priorities.