Pub Density Map
Discover how well-served your area is for pubs. Search any UK city or postcode and see all nearby pubs on an interactive map with density statistics.
Pub Density Finder
How the Pub Density Map Works
Enter a postcode or place name and the tool searches OpenStreetMap for everything tagged as a pub within a 2 km radius, plotting them as pins on a Leaflet map. It also counts pubs within 1 km, calculates the density per square kilometre, and gives you a simple verdict on whether the area is well-served, reasonably served, or thin on the ground.
Pub data comes from the OSM database, which is crowd-edited but has fairly thorough UK coverage thanks to active local mapping communities. Each pub pin shows the name (pulled from the pub's 'name' tag) where the data has it, falling back to the operator or street name when the name field is empty. Newer pubs and recent renamings might not have made it into OSM yet, but the major chains and most independents are present.
What 'Pub Density' Actually Means
The number of pubs per square kilometre, computed from the count of pubs within 1 km of your search point divided by the area of that 1 km circle (about 3.14 km²). For context, the UK averages roughly 0.7 pubs per 1,000 residents (down from over 2 per 1,000 in the 1970s, as ONS pub-count data shows), so the density per square kilometre depends heavily on local population density. Central Manchester or Edinburgh hits 5+ pubs per square kilometre. Rural Norfolk might be 0.1.
The map is most useful for areas you don't know well: a new neighbourhood you're moving to, a town you're visiting for a weekend, or a meeting point you want to be confident has somewhere to retreat to afterwards. It also shows, by absence, which areas have lost their pubs over the years. The 'pub desert' phenomenon (suburbs with no surviving pubs) is visible as expanses of map with no pins.
Pub Density Benchmarks
| Area type | Typical pubs per km² | What it feels like |
|---|---|---|
| City centre (Soho, Edinburgh Old Town) | 8-15 | Pub on every corner |
| Inner suburb of major city | 2-4 | Three or four within 10 min walk |
| Outer suburb | 0.5-1.5 | One local within walking distance |
| Market town | 2-5 | Concentrated around the high street |
| Village | 0.2-1 | One or two pubs total, often historic |
| Rural | Under 0.2 | Drive or walk a mile or more |
Caveats and Limitations
The 2 km search radius and the OSM data freshness are the main limitations. Pubs that closed during the post-2008 contraction or the COVID-era casualties may still appear on the map until a local mapper deletes them. New micro-pubs and taproom openings often take months to be added. The tool also makes no distinction between a thriving wet-led pub, a gastropub, a Spoons, or a private members' club mistakenly tagged as a pub.
It can't tell you whether the pubs are any good. For that, sites like CAMRA's WhatPub, Google reviews, or local CAMRA branch newsletters are better sources. This is purely a quantity-and-location tool. If you'd rather know how far you'd have to walk to reach the nearest one, the [Walking Time Calculator](/walking-time-calculator) handles point-to-point routing on real footpaths.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does the pub data come from?
OpenStreetMap, queried via the Overpass API. OSM is a free, crowd-edited geographic database (think Wikipedia for maps). UK pub coverage is generally strong because mapping pubs is a popular pastime among contributors. The data lags real-world changes by weeks to months for popular areas, longer for remote ones.
Why does my favourite pub not appear?
Either it's tagged as something other than amenity=pub in OSM (perhaps as a bar, restaurant, or hotel with bar), it hasn't been added yet, or it's outside the 2 km search radius. You can check whatpub.com or open up openstreetmap.org and search for the pub by name to see how it's tagged. If it's missing entirely, anyone can add it via the OSM editor.
What's the best area in the UK for pubs?
By raw count, central London (Soho, Covent Garden, the City). By pubs per resident, smaller market towns like Norwich, York, Edinburgh's Old Town, or stretches of the Lake District. Glasgow, Manchester and Liverpool all have high inner-city densities. The CAMRA Good Beer Guide's longest entries by city are a reasonable proxy for quality density.
Why is the verdict different from my own count?
The verdict is based on density per square kilometre within a 1 km radius, not the absolute count. A small town with 8 pubs in a tight cluster scores higher than a sprawling suburb with 12 pubs spread across 4 square kilometres. The metric is meant to capture 'pubs you can walk to' rather than 'pubs in this town'.
Does the map show closed pubs?
Not deliberately, but OSM doesn't always get updated when a pub closes. If you spot a pub on the map that's known to have shut, it's worth flagging on OSM directly so the next user gets accurate data. The map does not currently distinguish 'permanently closed' from 'open' venues.
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