Is Bideford, Devon a nice place to live?

Is Bideford a nice place to live or is Bideford rough? Forget local estate agents sales speil and local councillors who say that Bideford is on the up an up, it's time for a bit of reality. Cold hard statistics culled from the Police, the Indices of Deprivation and the latest census. Is Bideford truly a nice place to live, or are Barnstaple, Great Torrington and Northam a lot better? Time to find out.

What are the crime levels like in Bideford?

Using the latest Police street crime figures (typically from 3 months ago) we have compiled a table of the most voilent Policing areas in and around Bideford. Naturally the more urban and more central areas will have a higher rate of crime, but often you can be surprised when that is not the case and that is the area you want to move to.
Policing Area Voilent Crimes
Bideford 43
Silford 9
Buckleigh 9
Appledore 2
Instow 1
Abbotsham 1
Landcross 0
Hallspill 0
Saltrens 0
Weare Giffard 0

The English Indices of Deprivation also has crime statistics for Bideford. These statistics are published by the government every 2-3 years. They are a measure of how likely you are to be a victim of personal or material crime in an area, such as muggings or burglary. We've taken the rank average for wards in and around Bideford and compared them. The table below shows ten wards in this area, from the best to the worst.

You least likely to be a victim of crime in the Fremington ward.

Ward Average rank in England
Fremington (Best) 31241/32845
Appledore 28454/32845
Northam 27919/32845
Instow 26810/32845
Great Torrington 26797/32845
Westward Ho! 23889/32845
Bideford West 23254/32845
Bideford East 23090/32845
Bideford North 17504/32845
Reader Opinion:

Landkey is a depressing festering place

Your Health in Bideford

If you are thinking of moving to Bideford, you want to know if the place is likely to put you on a downward spiral of ill health. We've taken the healh question from the latest census to find out and how Bideford compares to its neighbouring local authorities. People were asked to rate their current health from very bad to very good;

Town Very Bad Bad
Cornwall 1.43% 4.87%
North Devon 1.27% 4.34%
Torridge (Bideford) 1.31% 4.9%
West Devon 1.18% 3.96%

The English Indices of Deprivation also has health statistics for Bideford. They measures the risk of premature death and the impairment of quality of life through poor physical or mental health, lovely! We've collated an average rank for all the Lower Super Output Areas (LSOA) in each ward in and around Bideford. The table below shows ten wards in this area, from the best to the worst;

Ward Average rank in England
Instow (Best) 19523/32845
Great Torrington 16538/32845
Fremington 14334/32845
Northam 13792/32845
Bideford East 11763/32845
Bideford West 11260/32845
Westward Ho! 10972/32845
Appledore 10276/32845
Bideford North 9583/32845
Reader Opinion:

Ilfracombe: gluten intolerant middle class nightmare

Deprivation in Bideford

Using the English Indices of Deprivation statistics, we've collated the average Index of Multiple Deprivation rank of all the LSOAs in the wards in and around Bideford. In layman's terms, this is how rough the ward is based on mutiple measures of deprivation including; employment, income, health, crime, housing and outside space.

Ward Average rank in England
Fremington (Best) 22653/32845
Great Torrington 17976/32845
Northam 17395/32845
Instow 15346/32845
Appledore 14902/32845
Westward Ho! 13608/32845
Bideford West 12395/32845
Bideford North 11225/32845
Bideford East 10696/32845

Average rent in Bideford

Every six months the Office for National statitics publishes a snapshot of rental costs. These statistics for Bideford are dated September 2021. They are split into three figures, the lower quartile, mean and upper quartile. If you recieve housing benefit or the housing benefit section of Universal Credit, the lower quartile is at the top limit of what would be affordable. The mean is the average you'd expect to pay for a rental property and the upper quartile is the average rental cost of the most expensive 25% of properties in Bideford.

Weekly Gross Pay and Hourly Pay in Bideford

If you are thinking of moving to Bideford, you'll want to know how much you can earn in a job in the town. The government publish regular statistics on gross weekly pay and pay per hour.

How grim is your Postcode?