Swanage
TownTown in Dorset, South West.
Swanage is an ONS built-up area: the land built up as one town, whatever council it is in. Figures for Swanage add up the census output areas (or, for claimants, the neighbourhoods) that sit mostly inside it, so they are close to, but not exactly, the town’s own.
Radon Affected Area by town
Worked out by Open Index · 2022
About 3% of people in Swanage live in a 1 km square that the radon atlas marks as a radon Affected Area.
How Swanage compares
Each dot is a town. The black line marks the middle one.
Is Swanage safe? What police records show
In the 12 months to August 2026, police recorded crimes and anti-social behaviour in Swanage at a rate of 50.5 per 1,000 people.
That compares with 83.5 per 1,000 people across South West.
Across England as a whole, the recorded crime rate was 96.3 per 1,000 people.
In August 2026 alone, 62 cases of crime and anti-social behaviour were recorded in Swanage.
In the 12 months to August 2026, the most common types were violence and sexual offences (188), anti-social behaviour (109) and other crime (62).
A year earlier, the recorded crime rate in Swanage was 45.4 per 1,000 people.
Worked out by Open Index from police.uk crime records and ONS and NISRA population estimates.
Rates are per resident, so places that many people work in or visit, such as Westminster, the City of London and other city centres, have far higher rates than their residents alone would suggest.
Deprivation in Swanage, neighbourhood by neighbourhood
- Deprivation is ranked by neighbourhood, so Swanage has no single figure. Of its 7 neighbourhoods with a rank:
- Decile 4: 1 neighbourhood
- Decile 5: 1 neighbourhood
- Decile 6: 3 neighbourhoods
- Decile 7: 2 neighbourhoods
English Indices of Deprivation 2025. Decile 1 is the most deprived tenth of neighbourhoods in England.
Neighbourhoods in Swanage
| Name | People (census) | Recorded crime per 1,000 | Deprivation decile | Gigabit broadband |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dorset 042A | 1,110 | 28.6 per 1,000 | 7 | 94.7% |
| Dorset 042B | 1,128 | 82.5 per 1,000 | 7 | 35.4% |
| Dorset 042C | 1,696 | 42.0 per 1,000 | 6 | 60.9% |
| Dorset 042D | 1,326 | 52.1 per 1,000 | 6 | 61.0% |
| Dorset 042E | 1,561 | 61.4 per 1,000 | 6 | 80.7% |
| Dorset 042F | 1,185 | 47.1 per 1,000 | 4 | 84.7% |
| Dorset 042G | 1,422 | 42.3 per 1,000 | 5 | 79.5% |
Your MP
- Lloyd HattonLabourMP for South Dorset
As of , from the UK Parliament Members API. Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0. Source: UK Parliament, Members API.
Council1
Postcode districts covering Swanage1
Middle areas in Swanage1
Towns near Swanage6
Swanage in brief
Swanage is a town in Dorset, South West.
About 9,069 people lived in Swanage in mid-2024 (worked out by Open Index from ONS small-area estimates); the median price paid for a home was £350,000 in 2025 across 177 sales (HM Land Registry) and police recorded crimes and anti-social behaviour at a rate of 50.5 per 1,000 people in the 12 months to August 2026 (police.uk).
The median price paid for a home in Swanage was £350,000 in 2025.
Swanage had 9,115 usual residents at the census.
About 3% of people in Swanage live in a 1 km square that the radon atlas marks as a radon Affected Area.
In Swanage, 68.3% of homes and businesses could get gigabit-capable broadband in January 2026.