The best places for families in England and Wales
Areas where at least 80% of schools are Good or Outstanding and crime runs below 90 per 1,000 residents — a little under the national median — ranked on a family score built from the mix of primary and secondary provision. The share of households with children is shown alongside, because a good school in an area of one-person flats tells you less than the same school somewhere families already are.
AL4 (St. Albans) tops the list on 100/100, with SW19 (London) at number 50 on 100/100. 830 postcode areas met the thresholds for this ranking.
| # | Area | Family score | Avg price | Crime /1k | Schools Good+ | Liveability |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | AL4 St. Albans | 100/100 | £637,981 | 62.0 | 100.0% | 87/100 |
| 2 | AL5 Harpenden | 100/100 | £860,421 | 48.9 | 100.0% | 86/100 |
| 3 | BD16 Bingley | 100/100 | £232,836 | 81.3 | 100.0% | 85/100 |
| 4 | BN14 Worthing | 100/100 | £372,989 | 71.1 | 100.0% | 83/100 |
| 5 | BR2 Bromley | 100/100 | £547,821 | 70.0 | 100.0% | 84/100 |
| 6 | BR3 Beckenham | 100/100 | £564,145 | 86.7 | 100.0% | 88/100 |
| 7 | BR6 Orpington | 100/100 | £582,556 | 71.7 | 100.0% | 87/100 |
| 8 | BS31 Bristol | 100/100 | £379,931 | 89.1 | 100.0% | 85/100 |
| 9 | BS37 Bristol | 100/100 | £330,605 | 78.1 | 100.0% | 79/100 |
| 10 | CA7 Wigton | 100/100 | £208,219 | 50.0 | 100.0% | 77/100 |
| 11 | CH4 Chester | 100/100 | £296,793 | 56.9 | 100.0% | 79/100 |
| 12 | CH63 Wirral | 100/100 | £245,267 | 43.1 | 100.0% | 86/100 |
| 13 | CM23 Bishop's Stortford | 100/100 | £486,102 | 80.0 | 100.0% | 83/100 |
| 14 | CW2 Crewe | 100/100 | £223,183 | 83.6 | 100.0% | 82/100 |
| 15 | DA15 Sidcup | 100/100 | £431,335 | 56.2 | 100.0% | 82/100 |
| 16 | DY6 Kingswinford | 100/100 | £242,419 | 45.7 | 100.0% | 82/100 |
| 17 | E4 London | 100/100 | £487,564 | 85.6 | 100.0% | 85/100 |
| 18 | EN4 Barnet | 100/100 | £704,922 | 69.9 | 100.0% | 80/100 |
| 19 | EN5 Barnet | 100/100 | £657,580 | 85.3 | 100.0% | 80/100 |
| 20 | GU9 Farnham | 100/100 | £528,075 | 56.9 | 100.0% | 86/100 |
| 21 | HA5 Pinner | 100/100 | £645,326 | 62.3 | 100.0% | 85/100 |
| 22 | IG10 Loughton | 100/100 | £569,806 | 82.5 | 100.0% | 84/100 |
| 23 | IG8 Woodford Green | 100/100 | £598,180 | 59.4 | 100.0% | 82/100 |
| 24 | IP4 Ipswich | 100/100 | £259,147 | 74.5 | 100.0% | 85/100 |
| 25 | KT15 Addlestone | 100/100 | £461,403 | 73.2 | 100.0% | 81/100 |
| 26 | KT2 Kingston upon Thames | 100/100 | £831,632 | 66.9 | 100.0% | 79/100 |
| 27 | KT3 New Malden | 100/100 | £641,356 | 64.2 | 100.0% | 82/100 |
| 28 | KT6 Surbiton | 100/100 | £614,129 | 89.5 | 100.0% | 84/100 |
| 29 | L15 Liverpool | 100/100 | £201,117 | 84.1 | 100.0% | 77/100 |
| 30 | L31 Liverpool | 100/100 | £222,283 | 52.9 | 100.0% | 84/100 |
| 31 | LS16 Leeds | 100/100 | £342,949 | 88.5 | 100.0% | 84/100 |
| 32 | LU4 Luton | 100/100 | £369,006 | 72.3 | 100.0% | 80/100 |
| 33 | ME8 Gillingham | 100/100 | £334,775 | 63.4 | 100.0% | 83/100 |
| 34 | NE25 Whitley Bay | 100/100 | £233,983 | 59.4 | 100.0% | 84/100 |
| 35 | NE38 Washington | 100/100 | £234,112 | 76.6 | 100.0% | 78/100 |
| 36 | NG34 Sleaford | 100/100 | £227,402 | 66.7 | 100.0% | 78/100 |
| 37 | NG9 Nottingham | 100/100 | £269,183 | 84.3 | 100.0% | 80/100 |
| 38 | NW7 London | 100/100 | £745,391 | 80.1 | 100.0% | 80/100 |
| 39 | PE7 Peterborough | 100/100 | £279,710 | 82.0 | 100.0% | 82/100 |
| 40 | PO7 Waterlooville | 100/100 | £354,809 | 65.4 | 100.0% | 82/100 |
| 41 | PR8 Southport | 100/100 | £246,286 | 80.5 | 100.0% | 73/100 |
| 42 | RG12 Bracknell | 100/100 | £434,345 | 87.3 | 100.0% | 83/100 |
| 43 | RG41 Wokingham | 100/100 | £514,342 | 41.7 | 100.0% | 85/100 |
| 44 | RG7 Reading | 100/100 | £552,434 | 58.2 | 100.0% | 77/100 |
| 45 | RM14 Upminster | 100/100 | £562,070 | 59.5 | 100.0% | 83/100 |
| 46 | S10 Sheffield | 100/100 | £340,276 | 59.2 | 100.0% | 81/100 |
| 47 | SL3 Slough | 100/100 | £591,168 | 87.3 | 100.0% | 79/100 |
| 48 | SM3 Sutton | 100/100 | £503,993 | 63.1 | 100.0% | 80/100 |
| 49 | SM6 Wallington | 100/100 | £431,784 | 82.8 | 100.0% | 80/100 |
| 50 | SW19 London | 100/100 | £908,554 | 78.8 | 100.0% | 86/100 |
How this ranking is built
Every figure is calculated from official data by postcode area — the outward code, the part of a postcode before the space. Sold prices are what buyers actually paid, as registered with HM Land Registry. Crime is street-level police data matched to postcode areas through the neighbourhoods inside them. School ratings are current Ofsted grades across 26,824 schools. Population, tenure and household figures come from the 2021 Census.
Areas with too few sales or residents to rank meaningfully are excluded, as are non-residential ones — business parks, airports and single-company campuses have sold prices but nobody lives in them. Where a figure is unknown the area is left out of that ranking rather than counted as zero.