Crap Towns / Shropshire / Oswestry
Oswestry
28/100Crap Score
Known as Oz or Ozzy. Locals are Oswestrians.
705th crappest of 984 towns, and 4th in Shropshire. 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
Got something to say about Oswestry? Write in.
agree it's crap have defended it
English town, Welsh league.
An Iron Age hillfort, a statue of a sheep, and a high street turning into charity shops.
Oswestry has a cracking Iron Age hillfort that's kept everyone out for two and a half thousand years, and now has to keep out a housing estate. Down in Oz there's a statue of a shepherd and his sheep where the livestock market used to be. The shops keep shutting and turning into charity shops, so everyone goes to Shrewsbury or Telford.
It's English, but the football's in the Welsh league, and so's the weather. There's rain on 147 days a year, and the storm overflows spill at 3.8 times the typical town's rate, so it isn't all rain in the river. On a Sunday the whole town gets 35 bus departures. Mind you, it's got pubs and hairdressers coming out of its ears, so you can get pissed and have your hair done while you wait for Monday.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Oswestry's 85 for broadband means it's crapper than 85% of towns.
- Broadband85/10010.8% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 25.4% across the Shropshire council area
- Sewage spills84/1001,039 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
- Rain72/100147 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Anti-social behaviour51/10015.5 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Criminal damage and arson47/1006.8 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Serious road collisions37/1002.1 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Food hygiene16/1000.8% rated 0 to 2, of the 121 food businesses with a rating
- Air pollution11/1004.7 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 5.3 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Fly-tipping9/1004.3 incidents per 1,000 people a year, Shropshire council area, 2022-23 to 2024-25
- Deliberate fires2/1001.5 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Telford | 59 |
| In danger of becoming nice from here down.2 | Shrewsbury | 39 |
| 3 | Newport | 29 |
| 4 | Oswestry | 28 |
| 5 | Bridgnorth | 23 |
| 6 | Ludlow | 19 |
| 7 | Market Drayton | 8 |
Below the dashed line: in danger of becoming nice.
Oswestry by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 74.1 crimes per 1,000 people a year (September 2023 to August 2026) About the same: About the same as the typical town's 76.2
- 398 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 227 per 10,000 people, 66.8x the typical town's 3.4
- 4 serious pollution incidents within 1 km since 2016, the latest in 2023
What's left on the high street
- 23 pubs, 24 hairdressers, 8 charity shops, 3 bookmakers, 1 vape shop, 7 banks, 2 Greggs on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 5.3% of takeaways rated 0 to 2 for hygiene (1 of 19) Worse: 33% higher than the typical town's 4.0%
- 2 bank branch closures announced since 2022 Worse: 11.4 per 100,000 people, 3.4x the typical town's 3.4
- 5 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Better: 2.9 per 10,000 people, 1.8x the typical town's 1.6
- 3 public swimming pools open; 3 closed for good since 2010 Better: 1.7 per 10,000 people, 2.4x the typical English town's 0.7
- 1 place on England's Heritage at Risk register
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 11.14pm last bus out on a Wednesday Worse: Earlier than the typical town's 12.14am
- Under 0.1% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Better: Far lower than the typical town's 0.5%
- 13.8% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 11% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,400 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Worse: 9% lower than the typical town's 1,532
Shropshire council
Have a crap-off
Oswestry 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.