OS Open Built Up Areas

A dataset representing Built Up Areas of Great Britain designed to underpin statistical analysis and contribute to policy enablement across the public sector.

  • Addressing and location
  • Download
  • OS OpenData Plan (FREE)
  • Premium Plan
  • Public Sector Plan

This product is updated every two years

Representation of data provided
Representation of data provided
© Crown copyright and database rights. Ordnance Survey 2024

What OS Open Built Up Areas provides you with

Statistical analysis underpinning delivery of government policy

Built Up Areas are used to analyse census data to understand their characteristics and output a range of statistics, informing government policy.

GSS codes deliver value across government departments

GSS codes enable you to link statistics across government departments to Built Up Areas, improving consistency and accuracy for decision making and planning.

Monitoring change over time

Monitor your data related to Built Up Areas over time to improve your understanding of economic, social and environmental factors. You can also track changes or policy delivery to improve your planning and services.

Unique and interoperable

Built Up Areas contains three unique datasets, each linked using the GSS code and name, offering maximum flexibility to meet your needs.

Informative

Built Up Areas allow policy makers and analysts, both nationally and locally, to conduct analysis corresponding to actual urban extents such as those of towns, cities and villages. They allow economic, social and environmental issues to be understood on the basis of the actual settlements that most people in Great Britain live in and in doing so aide in the design and implementation of policy areas such as levelling-up and net-zero.

Accessible

A new product available from the OS Data Hub means it's available to anyone interested in Built Up Areas, maximising accessibility and delivering huge value. The data will be maintained and updated every two years and you can link your data using the GSS codes which are recognised and widely used across Government.

OS Open Built Up Areas

Technical information

© Crown copyright and database rights. Ordnance Survey 2024

Specifications

Use cases

OS Open Built Up Areas enables policy makers and analysts, both nationally and locally, to conduct analysis corresponding to actual urban extents, for example, at a town, city, and village level.

The product can also be used to:

  • monitor changes related to built-up areas over time
  • support demographic population density statistics
  • provide insights into non-built-up areas that can be used to inform and calculate statistics, such as the impact of natural capital on house prices.
Access
  • Download
Data theme
  • Address
  • Land Use
Data structure
Vector - Polygons
Coverage
Great Britain
Scale
1:1250 to 1:250,000
Format
  • CSV
  • GeoPackage
Ordering area
  • All of Great Britain
Publication months
  • April
OS Data Hub plan
  • OS OpenData Plan (FREE)
  • Premium Plan
  • Public Sector Plan

Documents and Support

Getting started guides

  • OS Open Built Up Areas - Overview
    The overview introduces the product and gives context for all users. It highlights key features, provides examples of potential uses for the product and lists details like file sizes, supply formats, etc.
    pdf
    v1.0
    1.1 mb
    7 December 2022
  • Getting started with GeoPackage
    This guide helps you to get started using GeoPackage - a lightweight format that can contain large amounts of complex data in a single, easy to distribute and ready to use file.
    pdf
    v2
    1.11 mb
    30 September 2021

Technical specification

Release notes

OS Open Built Up Areas

Get this product

What you get

Key features
  • Statistical analysis underpinning delivery of government policy
  • GSS codes deliver value across government departments
  • Monitoring change over time
  • Unique and interoperable
  • Informative
  • Accessible
Category
Addressing and location
Access
  • Download
Data structure
Vector - Polygons
Update frequency
Every two years

How to access

OS OpenData is free

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Further support

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