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List of smallest cities in the United Kingdom

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Map of St Davids in Pembrokeshire, Wales, demonstrating the size of the settlement (grey), compared to its wider community boundary. Also indicated are isolated hamlets within the city.
  City boundaries
  Built-up area

The table displays the 31 smallest of the cities in the United Kingdom across three measures. Most of these appear in all three of the following categories:

  • Area (body):[a] This default sort ranks the physically smallest 23 local government areas (parish/community, district, county) and if missing, a built-up locality that has city status
  • Area (locale): 24 cities with the smallest same-name built-up area (many cities have much countryside and multiple settlements within their boundaries)
  • Census population:} 24 cities around 100,000 residents and fewer since the 2001 census

Lichfield, Hereford and Salisbury, in addition to being some of the smallest cities in England, are among the most populous civil parishes.

The least populous cities on all of British territory are Jamestown in St Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha (pop. 629) and Hamilton in Bermuda (pop. 854).

List

[edit]
City County/​council area ​(Scotland/Wales) Area (body/locale)[a] Body[a] Area (locale)[b] Locale/
body % 		Census population[1] Country
Rank sq mi (km2) Rank sq mi (km2) Rank
(2011) 		2021 2011 2001
City of London City of London 1 1.12 (2.90) County 3 — — 2 8,583 7,375 7,185[1] England
Wells Somerset 2 2.11 (5.46) Parish 4 1.35 (3.50) 63.99% 3 11,145 10,536 10,406[2] England
St Asaph Denbighshire 3 2.49 (6.45) Community 2 0.50 (1.29) 20.19% — 3,485 3,355[c] 3,491[c] Wales
Bangor Gwynedd 4 2.79 (7.23) Community 5 1.65 (4.27) 59.20% 5 15,060 16,358[3] 13,725[4] Wales
Ripon North Yorkshire 5 3.83 (9.92) Parish 7 1.97 (5.10) 51.36% 6 16,590 16,702[5] 15,922[6] England
Armagh County Armagh 6 — None 11 3.97 (10.28) — 4 14,749 14,590 Northern Ireland
Chichester West Sussex 7 4.12 (10.67) Parish 9 3.32 (8.60) 80.77% 9 29,407 26,795 23,731[7] England
Truro Cornwall 8 4.15 (10.75) Parish 8 2.83 (7.33) 68.25% 7 21,046 18,766 17,431[8] England
Lichfield Staffordshire 9 5.41 (14.01) Parish 10 3.35 (8.68) 61.84% 11 32,580 32,219 27,900[9] England
Newry County Armagh/Down 10 — None 16 5.43 (14.06) — 10 TBC 26,967 27,433[c] Northern Ireland
Perth Perth & Kinross 11 — None 19 6.71 (17.38) — — TBC 46,970[c][10] 43,450[c] Scotland
Salisbury Wiltshire 12 7.14 (18.49) Parish 12 4.36 (11.29) 61.04% 12 41,552 40,302 39,726​[11][12] England
Lisburn County Antrim​/Down 13 — None 20 7.53 (19.50) — 13 TBC 45,370[13] 71,465[c] Northern Ireland
Bangor County

Down

14 — None 21 7.55 (19.55) — — 61,011[c] 58,388[c] Northern Ireland
Hereford Herefordshire 15 7.85 (20.33) Parish 17 6.58 (17.04) 83.82% 15 53,113 58,896[14] 50,154[15] England
Stirling Stirling 16 — None 23 7.91 (20.49) — 14 TBC 45,750 45,115[c] Scotland
City of Westminster Greater London 17 8.29 (21.47) District 24 — — — 204,236 219,396 181,286 England
Inverness Highland 18 — None — 10.28 (26.63) — 16 TBC 61,235​[16][17] 71,000 Scotland
City of Carlisle Cumbria 19 10.38 (26.88)[d] Trustee 22 7.76 (20.10) 74.75% 23 74,428 107,524 100,739 England
Dunfermline Fife 20 — None — 10.85 (28.10) — — 68,426[18][c] 39,320[19][c] Scotland
Worcester Worcestershire 21 12.85 (33.28) District — 9.52 (24.66) 74.12% 22 103,872 98,768 93,353[20] England
Derry County​ Londonderry 22 — None — 13.10 (33.93) — 18 TBC 85,016 83,652 Northern Ireland
Lincoln Lincolnshire 23 13.78 (35.69) District — 12.61 (32.66) 91.48% 20 103,813 93,541 85,595[21] England
St Davids Pembrokeshire — 17.88 (46.31) Community 1 0.23 (0.596) 1.29% 1 1,751 1,841 1,797[22] Wales
Ely Cambridgeshire — 22.86 (59.21) Parish 6 1.84 (4.77) 8.04% 8 20,574 20,256 15,102[23] England
City of Bath Somerset — 28.68 (74.28)[e] Trustee — 11.07 (28.67) — 19 97,066 88,859 83,992[24] England
City of Canterbury Kent — 119.25 (308.86) District 15 5.09 (13.18) 4.27% — 157,432 151,145 135,278 England
City of Durham County Durham — 186.68 (483.50)[f] Trustee 14 4.96 (12.85) — 21 101,372 94,375 87,709[30] England
Wrexham Wrexham — 194.51 (503.78) District 18 6.70 (17.35) 3.45% — 135,117[c] 134,884[c] 128,476[c] Wales
City of Winchester Hampshire — 255.20 (660.96) District 13 4.76 (12.33) 1.86% 24 127,444 116,595 107,222 England
City of Chester Cheshire — 448.04 (1,160.42)[g] Trustee — 9.85 (25.51) — 17 TBC 79,645[31] 77,040[32] England

See also

[edit]

Notes

[edit]
  1. ^ a b c The area (body) measurement is the size of a localised council area which is designated as a city, if there is one. Council area boundaries are well-defined, and cities are typically awarded the honour via parish or principal governing public bodies. Many in the table are parishes (England) or communities (Wales), except for the City of London (county). Several districts that hold city status are shown as the areas become larger; these are named after their only settlement or largest town in the case of multiple settlements. Cities can also be boroughs, which are an honorific title for districts. In Scotland and Northern Ireland wider council areas can hold the title on behalf of a city urban area much like a charter trust and in Northern Ireland particularly, these mainly have multiple place names in their titles, so the area (body) does not apply in these cases. Some local legal entity types such as communities in Scotland or townlands in Northern Ireland do not at present hold city status.
  2. ^ The area (locale) reflects the built up area that most closely corresponds to the urban area of the named city settlement, which means for many small cities that portions of their administrative area is rural land.It is used in the statistics instead of the body size where there is no local government entity, e.g. unparished area with city charter trustees, or cities designated by their urban area (Scotland, Northern Ireland). This is a secondary method of determining physical size; relatively fewer cities are explicitly defined in this way, and their urban area can extend beyond the city boundary. London and Westminster are completely surrounded by a much larger built-up area (Greater London) and so any parkland within these is considered part of their urban landscape. Thus Wells is the smallest standalone city, as it is wholly surrounded by countryside
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Not a city at time of census
  4. ^ this was reformed in April 2023, from a district measuring 401.28 sq mi (1,039.31 km2) to a smaller, mainly unparished area covering several district wards
  5. ^ the city area given is the area of the former borough, in existence until 1996
  6. ^ this was parished in 2018, but city charter trustees continue to exist, and so hold the charter on behalf of the city area covered by the much wider Durham city district council until 2009. The 2011 population is that of wards covering the same area. The title is not held by the parish council.[25][26][27] Size of the parish is 5.56 sq mi (14.40 km2) and its population 20,115 (2011).[28][29]
  7. ^ the area given is the prior City of Chester district active until 2009. Population of wards in 2001 was 118,210.
  • Statistics in italics have been added for completion of the table. These are in numerical but non-ranking order.
  • English cities prefixed 'City of...' are districts so named to distinguish them from a namesake settlement area which does not have city status, with the City of London having additional county status. All of these except London have several communities and suburbs within their boundaries, with most containing large swathes of countryside, extra settlements and sometimes parishes/communities.

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Census 2001 : City of London
  2. ^ Census 2001 : Mendip
  3. ^ UK Census (2011). "Local Area Report – Bangor Parish (1170221346)". Nomis. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
  4. ^ Census 2001 : Gwynedd Archived 2010-09-22 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ^ UK Census (2011). "Local Area Report – Ripon Parish (1170217073)". Nomis. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
  6. ^ Census 2001 : Harrogate
  7. ^ Census 2001 : Chichester
  8. ^ Census 2001 : Carrick
  9. ^ Census 2001 : Lichfield
  10. ^ "Perth & Kinross Council - Census 2011 (3 Perth wards)". www.pkc.gov.uk. Retrieved 2017-04-02.
  11. ^ Census 2001 : Salisbury (Former Local Authority)
  12. ^ Census 2001 : Salisbury
  13. ^ "Key Statistics" (PDF). www.niassembly.gov.uk.
  14. ^ "2011 CENSUS KEY STATISTICS - Hereford City" (PDF). factsandfigures.herefordshire.gov.uk/about-your-area/2011-census-market-town-profiles.aspx.
  15. ^ Census 2001 : Herefordshire
  16. ^ Butlin, Heather. "Highland profile - key facts and figures". www.highland.gov.uk. Retrieved 2017-04-02.
  17. ^ Council, The Highland. "The Highland Council download - Briefing notes | Planning and building standards | Planning - policies, advice and service levels". www.highland.gov.uk. Retrieved 2017-04-02.
  18. ^ "2011 census table data: Settlement 2010". Scotland's Census.
  19. ^ Team, National Records of Scotland Web (31 May 2013). "National Records of Scotland - 2001 population of urban areas". National Records of Scotland.
  20. ^ Census 2001 : Worcester
  21. ^ Office for National Statistics : Census 2001 : Key Statistics : City of Lincoln Retrieved 2009-11-22
  22. ^ Census 2001 : Pembrokeshire
  23. ^ Census 2001 : East Cambridgeshire
  24. ^ Bathnes.gov.uk Archived 2007-12-20 at the Wayback Machine, Bath and North East Somerset District Council: Population Statistics
  25. ^ "What you need to know about a new parish council for Durham city centre". The Northern Echo.
  26. ^ "Review of Community Governance in the Unparished Area of Durham City carried out by Durham County Council Final Recommendations (No Parishing Arrangements)" (PDF). www.durham.gov.uk.
  27. ^ "Review of Community Governance in the Central Unparished areas of Durham by Durham County Council" (PDF). www.durham.gov.uk.
  28. ^ UK Census (2011). "Local Area Report – Elvet Ward (as of 2011) (1237326530)". Nomis. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
  29. ^ UK Census (2011). "Local Area Report – Neville's Cross Ward (as of 2011) (1237326541)". Nomis. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
  30. ^ Census 2001 : Durham
  31. ^ "Locality Chester People and Population Profile Census 2011". inside.cheshirewestandchester.gov.uk.
  32. ^ "Demographics" (PDF). Cheshire County Council. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 26, 2008. Retrieved 27 September 2008.
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