Headington
Suburb · 10,059 residents
67Good
Good · better than 8 in 10 suburbs
Check Local Score out of 100 · 60 is typical for the country
Each arc is a topic, coloured by its score
What’s good
- 72% of residents live within five minutes of a park
- 100% of schools are rated Good or better by Ofsted
- Less recorded crime than is typical: 74 per 1,000 people a year against 100
Check before you view
- Prices are high for local incomes: affordability scores 39, where 60 is typical
The essentials
Everyday life
The area
Around Headington
Map outline: Neighbourhood boundary drawn by OpenStreetMap contributors
Is Headington a good place to live?
Headington scores 67/100 overall, which the scorecard rates as good — 60 is typical for the country.
It stands out for environment (76) and schools (71).
It scores lowest on affordability (39).
Scores come from official data on safety, schools, transport, prices, health, food & drink and the local environment, for Headington in South East, each measured against the national average.
Summary of Headington
Headington reads like a place built around institutions rather than a high street trying to please everyone — hospital scrubs, student bikes, and a fair number of people who work at the university or the John Radcliffe rather than commute into it. The density here is real: population is packed in well above the national and even regional average, which shows up as terraced streets and converted houses rather than sprawl, and gives the place a slightly hemmed-in, always-occupied feel rather than a sleepy one.
Housing here tells its own story before you even open the estate agent's window: semi-detached homes dominate the sales mix, most of it freehold, and the local semi-detached median of nearly £495,000 sits well clear of the national terraced or semi figures — this is a place where a "for sale" board usually means a family house changing hands, not a buy-to-let flat, though flats still make up a meaningful third of what's sold. Against Oxford as a whole, prices sit level rather than at a premium, so you're not paying extra just for the postcode. Schooling is a mixed picture worth sitting with: Barton Park and New Marston primaries both carry Good ratings, and Headington Rye is a fixture of the independent scene, but the average Ofsted score across sampled schools lands almost exactly on the national mean — solid, not exceptional, and worth checking against your specific catchment rather than assuming the area's reputation covers every school in it.