Southampton
Sourced, comparable data for Southampton — part of the same registry used across all 13 ceremonial-Hampshire authorities.
- Official name
- Southampton
- ONS geography code
- E06000045
- Authority type
- City / unitary authority
- City status
- City of Southampton
- Local government structure
- Unitary authority — no separate county council
Southampton in five numbers
259,424
people
current
highest of 13 authorities
73.3%
Employment rate
Apr 2025-Mar 2026
13th most favourable of 13 authorities
£260,000
Median house price
Year ending Sep 2025
6.9× local earnings
121 per 1,000
Police-recorded rate
year ending March 2025 (2024/25)
12th most favourable of 12 authorities
22.5%
Persistent absence rate
2023/24
12th most favourable of 13 authorities
What these numbers say
Southampton has a population of around 259,424, making it one of the larger of the 13 Hampshire authorities by population.
The employment rate stands at 73.3%. This is -2.2pp against the Great Britain figure of 75.5%. Among the 13 Hampshire authorities with a published figure, Southampton ranks 13th most favourable of 13 authorities on this measure.
The median house price is £260,000. The median house price is 6.9× local median full-time earnings.
The police-recorded crime rate is 121 per 1,000 population (England: 83.5 per 1,000). The persistent school-absence rate is 22.5% against an England figure of 20%.
Indicators are shown side by side. Association is described; no causal link between any two is implied.
Population
2 measuresSouthampton's population and age profile compared with the other 12 Hampshire authorities.
Population
Hampshire median: 135,201 across 13 of 13 authorities.
Median age
Hampshire median: 43.6 years across 13 of 13 authorities.
Source: ONS Explore Local Statistics. All 13; confirm each metric geography
Labour market
4 measuresEmployment rate ranked against all 13 authorities, with Southampton's own labour-market rates shown together.
Employment rate
Hampshire median: 79.3% across 13 of 13 authorities.
Southampton's own rates
Source: Nomis. All 13; use median gross annual earnings of full-time residents
Source: Nomis APS source. Local authority and above; flag modelled/sample limitations
Earnings
1 measureMedian full-time resident earnings ranked against all 13 Hampshire authorities.
Median earnings
Hampshire median: £41,356 across 13 of 13 authorities.
Major employers
The Port of Southampton
ABP's Southampton port handles around 3 million cruise passengers a year across five terminals, is the UK's leading vehicle-handling port (600,000 vehicles/year), and hosts the UK's second-largest container terminal. Nationally, the port is reported by ABP to support 45,600 jobs and contribute £2.5 billion to the UK economy annually — a whole-port figure, not a Southampton-city-specific one.
Source: ABP — Southampton
Source: Nomis. All 13; use median gross annual earnings of full-time residents
Housing
3 measuresHouse prices have changed since 2020; affordability is shown against local earnings and the other 12 authorities.
Year ending Sep 2020
£220,000
Year ending Sep 2025
£260,000
Change
+18.2%
2 published data points (GBP) — not a continuous series; no intermediate years are shown or implied.
Median house price
Hampshire median: £360,000 across 13 of 13 authorities.
Median private rent
Hampshire median: £995/mo across 13 of 13 authorities.
House price to earnings ratio
Hampshire median: 8.5× across 13 of 13 authorities.
Source: ONS local housing. All 13; show provisional status and exact month
Deprivation
2 measuresShare of neighbourhoods in the most-deprived national decile, and children in relative low income, compared with all 13 authorities.
Share of neighbourhoods in the most-deprived 10% nationally (IMD 2025)
Share of neighbourhoods in most-deprived deciles
Hampshire median: 0% across 13 of 13 authorities.
Children in relative low-income families, after housing costs
Children in relative low-income families
Hampshire median: 18.5% across 13 of 13 authorities.
Ward-level detail
The authority-wide deprivation figures above can conceal sharp variation between individual neighbourhoods. Southampton ranked 55th most deprived of England's 317 local authorities (English Indices of Deprivation 2019), with 19 of its neighbourhoods (LSOAs) among the most-deprived 10% nationally.
- • Bargate (Golden Grove), Weston, Thornhill and Millbrook contain Southampton's most deprived neighbourhoods on the 2019 Indices of Deprivation
- • Income deprivation affecting children ranges from under 5% in parts of Portswood, Shirley and Bassett to over 45% in parts of Redbridge and Woolston
- • 34% of state-school pupils were eligible for free school meals in 2022/23, against a 23.8% England average
- • Males in Southampton's most deprived areas live 7.8 years less, and females 3.4 years less, than those in the least deprived areas (2019–2021)
Source: Southampton Strategic Assessment: Deprivation and Poverty (Southampton Data Observatory / Southampton City Council, last updated January 2025), based on the English Indices of Deprivation 2019, DfE 2022/23 and DWP data as cited therein.
Source: English Indices of Deprivation 2025. Use LSOA distributions, not a single simplistic authority rank
Source: DWP Children in Low Income Families local area statistics. All 13; use the relative low-income, after-housing-costs measure for comparability
Crime
1 measurePolice-recorded crime rate ranked against the other Hampshire authorities with a published figure.
Police-recorded crime rate
Hampshire median: 60.6 per 1,000 across 12 of 13 authorities. Not yet published for Gosport.
Source: Local authority Community Safety Partnership strategic assessments. Each authority publishes its own document with its own reference period — never assume a shared period across authorities; check each figure’s own date
Health outcomes
1 measureLife expectancy by sex since 2001-2003, and the NHS services covering Southampton.
2001-2003 vs 2022 to 2024 — two published editions, not a continuous series.
Baseline is calculated from the published change since 2001-2003 (see Table view for the exact figures) — a UK Facts calculation, not an independently re-verified ONS figure for that year.
GP surgeries per 10,000 population
Hampshire median: 1.7 per 10,000 across 13 of 13 authorities.
NHS and local service access
- Acute trust(s)
- University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust
- Mental-health trust
- Hampshire and Isle of Wight Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust (operates Antelope House and Western Community Hospital mental health services in Southampton)
- Ambulance service
- South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust
- Principal hospital(s)
- Southampton General Hospital, Princess Anne Hospital
- Named emergency department(s)
- Southampton General Hospital Emergency Department
University Hospital Southampton — service geography context
University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust is one of the largest acute teaching trusts in England, and the designated major trauma centre for the Wessex region and the Channel Islands.
- • One of only two hospitals in southern England offering full on-site major trauma care for both adults and children
- • Specialist services include neurosciences, cancer, cardiovascular, respiratory medicine and specialist children's services
Source: University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust — About UHS
Source: ONS life expectancy for local areas of the UK. All 13; preserve the exact pooled period
Education
5 measuresSchool attendance and exclusion measures compared with the other 12 authorities.
Persistent absence rate
Hampshire median: 17.2% across 13 of 13 authorities.
Permanent exclusion rate
Hampshire median: 0.1 per 100 pupils across 13 of 13 authorities.
Special schools in the authority
Hampshire median: 6 across 13 of 13 authorities.
NEET rate (16-17 year olds)
Hampshire median: 5.2% across 2 of 13 authorities. Not yet published for Winchester, Basingstoke and Deane, East Hampshire, Eastleigh, Fareham, Gosport, Hart, Havant, New Forest, Rushmoor, Test Valley.
Education, Health and Care Plans (total)
Hampshire median: 2,051.5 across 2 of 13 authorities. Not yet published for Winchester, Basingstoke and Deane, East Hampshire, Eastleigh, Fareham, Gosport, Hart, Havant, New Forest, Rushmoor, Test Valley.
Source: DfE EHC plans 2026. Hampshire County Council, Portsmouth, Southampton only
Source: DfE data catalogue. Use only releases with suitable geography; label school-location vs responsible-LA
Source: DfE SEN in England 2025/26. Use with pupil and school geography clearly labelled
Politics
2 measuresCouncil political control and parliamentary representation for Southampton.
- Council political control
- Labour majority
- Parliamentary representation
- Southampton Itchen — Darren Paffey (Labour); Southampton Test — Satvir Kaur (Labour)
Source: Official council political-balance / LGA council-control records. All 13; each authority publishes its own election-results page — use the per-authority page, not a single aggregated source
Source: Commons Library election results. Use 2024 boundaries and explicit comparison basis
Council finance
1 measureBand D council tax (the district/borough element) compared with the other 10 district and borough authorities.
Band D council tax
Hampshire median: £197 across 11 of 13 authorities.
Source: MHCLG Council Tax levels set by local authorities in England. All 13; use the figure excluding local/parish precepts for cross-authority comparability
What we can't tell you yet
Every measure tracked on this page has a published figure for Southampton.
Profile content last built: 30 July 2026.
Southampton Innovation Cluster
All figures below are sourced from official publications — nothing is estimated or inferred.
🔬 Southampton Science Park
Owned by the University of Southampton, the Science Park is home to over 100 companies, around 15% of which are University spin-outs or founded by academic staff — including Perpetuum, a spin-out from the University's School of Electronics and Computer Science that harvests kinetic energy and was named among Europe's top-100 Cleantech companies. The park has a long-standing partnership with SETsquared, the top-ranked university business incubator globally.
Source: UK Science Park Association
🚢 Solent Freeport — Southampton Water tax sites
Southampton's Solent Freeport tax sites are branded “Southampton Water” and include Fawley Waterside, ExxonMobil (Fawley), Solent Gateway, ABP-Redbridge and ABP-Solent Gateway 2 (Portsmouth's tax site is separate). Freeport-wide — not Southampton-specific — the Solent Freeport is projected to support 15,000 jobs and a £1bn uplift in Gross Value Added; no site-level breakdown of that figure is published.
Source: Solent Freeport
⚓ Green shipping
The Port of Southampton has hosted live demonstrations of green maritime fuel — including the world's first dual-fuel ammonia vessel, Fortescue's Green Pioneer, which called at the port in 2025.
Source: ABP — Port of Southampton news