Crap Towns / Merseyside / Liverpool
Liverpool
98/100Crap Score
16th crappest of 984 towns, and the crappest in Merseyside. Higher scores are crapper.
Have your say
Crap Town of the Year 2026/27
See the raceThe public vote. It's separate from the Crap Score, and it closes on 31 December 2027.
Letters from the locals
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agree it's crap have defended it
Liverpool. Mind the scooters.
Great waterfront, great music, great football. Then you walk down from Lime Street.
Liverpool has the waterfront, the Liver Birds, the football and more famous bands than anywhere. It also has litter all round Lime Street, scooters on the pavements and buskers at full blast. Scousers argue about who's a proper Scouser and call everyone over the boundary a wool. Nobody argues about the litter.
The council records four times the typical council's fly-tipping, recycles less than a fifth of the household waste and charges £2,674 a year for a Band D home, 12% over England's average. There are 24 places on the Heritage at Risk register. A 0 to 2 hygiene rating is three and a half times as common here as in the typical town, and the bad crashes happen at twice the typical town's rate. Manchester will be thrilled.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Liverpool's 98 for food hygiene means it's crapper than 98% of towns.
- Food hygiene98/1008.5% rated 0 to 2, of the 3,011 food businesses with a rating
- Fly-tipping96/10043.7 incidents per 1,000 people a year, Liverpool council area, 2022-23 to 2024-25
- Serious road collisions96/1004.9 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Deliberate fires89/10020.0 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Criminal damage and arson86/10010.7 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Rain77/100152 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Anti-social behaviour75/10013.2 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Air pollution72/10012.6 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 6.7 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Broadband49/1008.1% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 8.4% across the Liverpool council area
- Sewage spills33/100114 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Liverpool | 98 |
| 2 | Birkenhead | 96 |
| 3 | Bootle | 92 |
| 4 | St Helens | 90 |
| 5 | Kirkby | 86 |
| 6 | Wallasey | 86 |
| 7 | Prescot | 83 |
| 8 | Huyton with Roby | 78 |
| 9 | Newton-le-Willows | 66 |
Liverpool by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 126 crimes per 1,000 people a year (September 2023 to August 2026) Worse: 1.7x the typical town's 76.2
- 956 reports of fly-tipping on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 18.9 per 10,000 people, 17.2x the typical town's 1.1
- 14 serious pollution incidents within 1 km since 2016, the latest in 2025
What's left on the high street
- 311 pubs, 171 hairdressers, 40 charity shops, 65 bookmakers, 12 vape shops, 28 banks, 20 Greggs on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 13.7% of takeaways rated 0 to 2 for hygiene (66 of 482) Worse: 3.4x the typical town's 4.0%
- 12 bank branch closures announced since 2022 Better: 2.4 per 100,000 people, 29% lower than the typical town's 3.4
- 73 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Worse: 1.4 per 10,000 people, 13% lower than the typical town's 1.6
- 26 public swimming pools open; 13 closed for good since 2010 Worse: 0.5 per 10,000 people, 29% lower than the typical English town's 0.7
- 24 places on England's Heritage at Risk register
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 1.04am last bus out on a Wednesday Better: Later than the typical town's 12.14am
- 2.5% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Worse: 5x the typical town's 0.5%
- 23.4% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Worse: 1.5x the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,473 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) About the same: About the same as the typical town's 1,532
Liverpool council
Have a crap-off
Liverpool against your mate's town, and a match ticket to rub it in.
- ?Fly-tippingper 1,000, council area?
- ?Anti-social behaviourper 1,000 people?
- ?Serious road crashesper 10,000 people?
- ?Sewage spillshours per 10,000 people?
- ?Food hygienerated poor?
- ?Criminal damageper 1,000 people?
- ?Dirty airµg/m³?
- ?No gigabitof premises can't get it?
- ?Deliberate firesper 10,000 people?
- ?Raindays a year?
Ten ingredients. One verdict. Who's crapper? The higher Crap Score takes it.