The best and worst places to live in Britain

The winner has lower crime rates, affordable living costs and higher salaries.

Edinburgh has been named the place to live in Britain.

Affordable living costs, high salaries, fast broadband and the lowest crime rate in the UK have seen the Scottish capital surge to number one, up 97 places from 2013, in the latest uSwitch Quality of Life Index.

Edinburgh Castle

It topped a list of 138 UK areas based on the uSwitch Quality of Life Index. It compared 138 local areas (NUTS3 regions) for 26 different indicators including salaries, disposable household income and the cost of essential goods and lifestyle factors such as working hours, life expectancy and hours of sunshine.

Solihull was been pushed into second place.

Scottish regions have been making the largest gains overall, with more than half improving their ranking since 2013. In fact, the top seven biggest climbers are all in Scotland.

The region of Inverclyde, East Renfrewshire and Renfrewshire (South Western Scotland), rose 102 places from 112^th to 10^th place, thanks to low household costs.

Gourock, Inverclyde

Check out the table below to see if you made it into the top 10:

2015 ranking	NUTS3 region	2013 ranking	Change in rank position since 2013
1	Edinburgh, Eastern Scotland	98	+97
2	Solihull, West Midlands	1	-1
3	Hertfordshire, East of England	3	0
4	Northumberland, North East	8	+4
5	South Lanarkshire, South Western Scotland	60	+55
6	Berkshire, South East	9	+3
7	Darlington, North East	25	+18
8	North Lanarkshire, South Western Scotland	106	+98
9	York, Yorkshire and Humber	15	+6
10	Inverclyde, East Renfrewshire, South Western Scotland	112	+102

Source: uSwitch

…And the worst?

The situation isn’t so wonderful for other parts of Britain. A whopping 16 out of the 20 biggest falling regions are in England, with Bradford and Hull placed right at the bottom.

Hull Marina

People in Bradford have among the lowest gross disposable household incomes at just £13,654 a year, but they have one of the highest weekly rents at £92.60.

To make matters worse they have a low employment rate of 65%, a lower than average life expectancy of 77 years and seven months for men and 81 years and four months for women and even crowded primary schools.

Bradford City Centre

However, Bradford residents do enjoy low costs on essentials like energy, food, Council Tax and cheaper house prices. They also have higher than average broadband speeds.

Here's how the bottom 10 shape up:

2015 ranking	NUTS3 region	2013 ranking	Change in rank position since 2013
138	Bradford, Yorkshire and the Humber	95	-43
137	Kingston Upon Hull, Yorkshire and The Humber	139	-7
136	North of Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland	68	-68
135	Eilean Siar (Western Isles), Highlands and Islands	120	-15
134	West and South of Northern Ireland	59	-75
133	Blackpool, North West	117	-16
132	Devon CC, South West	86	-46
131	Central Valleys, West Wales and The Valleys	121	-10
130	East of Northern Ireland	39	-91
129	South Teesside, North East	93	-36

Source: uSwitch

Ann Robinson, director of consumer policy at uSwitch.com, said: “What this report reveals is the vast differences in the quality of life that many people across the UK are experiencing. Despite a buoyant UK economy, millions of people in this country aren’t feeling the benefits.

“We shouldn’t kid ourselves that it’s getting better for everyone out there. The reality is that millions of British households are still facing huge financial pressures, with wages barely covering higher living costs. And with talk of interest rates rising, any hope that those financial pressures might ease seems a forlorn one.”

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