Crap Towns / Aberdeenshire / Portlethen
Portlethen
6/100Crap Score
Locals call it Porty.
Too small for the table, which starts at 10,000 people, but it still scores 6. 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 Portlethen? Write in.
agree it's crap have defended it
Portlethen. Where's the middle?
An Aberdeen commuter town with no proper centre, a bog in the middle and a smell nobody can explain.
Portlethen is where the oil money built houses and forgot to build a town to go with them. The shops are scattered about wherever there was room, and the bit in the middle is Portlethen Moss, which is a bog. Locals talk about the Portlethen pong. The storm overflows spilled nothing from 2023 to 2025, so it isn't the sewers, and nobody's worked out what it is.
There's no crime to speak of and play parks everywhere, nearly five times the typical town's. The weans are sorted. The grown-ups are in a queue to Aberdeen.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Portlethen's 91 for broadband means it's crapper than 91% of towns.
- Broadband91/1004.5% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 51.5% across the Aberdeenshire council area
- Food hygiene73/10010.5% told to improve, of the 38 food businesses inspected
- Rain69/100143 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Fly-tipping50/100
- Deliberate fires9/1006.3 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Air pollution2/1003.8 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 4.3 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Sewage spills2/1000.0 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
- Anti-social behaviour2/1001.9 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Criminal damage and arson1/1002.5 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Serious road collisions1/1000.2 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Peterhead | 50 |
| In danger of becoming nice from here down.2 | Fraserburgh | 35 |
| 3 | Inverurie | 21 |
| 4 | Stonehaven | 14 |
| 5 | Ellon | 6 |
| – | Portlethen | 6 |
| 6 | Westhill | 5 |
Below the dashed line: in danger of becoming nice.
Portlethen by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 20.4 crimes per 1,000 people a year (January 2023 to December 2025) Better: 63% lower than the typical Scottish town's 54.4
- 148 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 165 per 10,000 people, 29.5x the typical Scottish town's 5.6
What's left on the high street
- 3 pubs, 3 hairdressers, 1 charity shop, 1 bookmaker on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 1 public toilet on the map (October 2026) Worse: 1.1 per 10,000 people, 31% lower than the typical town's 1.6
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 12.29am last bus out on a Wednesday About the same: About the same as the typical town's 12.14am
- 0.4% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Better: 20% lower than the typical town's 0.5%
- 5.0% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 68% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,498 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) About the same: About the same as the typical town's 1,532
Aberdeenshire council
- £1,686 Band D council tax (2026-27) About the same: £33 more than the Scottish average
- 27% of Aberdeenshire council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Better: 25% lower than Scotland's 36%
- 88 ombudsman complaints decided in 2025-26, none upheld About the same: 33.4 per 100,000 residents, about the same as Scotland's 34.7
- 96.7% of the streets checked passed as clean (2025-26) About the same: About the same as Scotland's 92.2%
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Portlethen 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.