Greater Manchester in six numbers: crime, prices, broadband and air, council by council (2026)

Greater Manchester's ten council areas can look very different on paper. This post sets the same six official measures side by side for each of them, so you can see how they compare before you narrow a search.

Every figure comes from Jackson's league tables, which are built from official open data. Each one describes a whole council area, not a street.

Recorded crime

Offences per 1,000 residents a year (ONS / Home Office police recorded crime, year ending March 2026). All ten Greater Manchester areas are ranked.

Rates are per resident, so town centres with lots of visitors and workers can read higher than the risk to someone living there. Our guide on checking crime rates explains how to read the numbers for a single street.

Average house price

HM Land Registry UK House Price Index, July 2026. Cheapest to dearest:

• Wigan £194,551 · Bolton £204,379 · Rochdale £209,389 · Tameside £209,723
• Oldham £217,171 · Salford £229,462 · Bury £242,437 · Manchester £252,309
• Stockport £317,913 · Trafford £400,688

The gap between the cheapest and dearest area is about £206,000: an average Trafford home costs roughly twice an average Wigan one. A low average can reflect the mix of homes and demand, so it is a starting point for a search, not a verdict on a place.

Price change over 12 months

Same source. Nine of ten Greater Manchester areas rose; one fell.

• Rising: Trafford +9.6%, Bolton +5.9%, Oldham +4.7%, Rochdale +4.5%, Stockport +4.2%, Wigan +3.9%, Bury +2.8%, Manchester +1.2%, Salford +0.3%
• Falling: Tameside -0.1%

Gigabit broadband

Share of premises that can get a gigabit-capable connection (Ofcom Connected Nations, January 2026). Oldham leads at 97.2%, with Wigan (96.5%) and Tameside (95.1%) next. Manchester is lowest at 90.0%. Coverage can differ street by street, so check the postcode itself.

Air quality (fine particles, PM2.5)

Population-weighted background PM2.5 in µg/m³ (Defra modelled background PM2.5, 2024). Lower is cleaner. Cleanest: Wigan 6.7, Bolton 6.9, Rochdale 7.1. Highest: Tameside 7.6, Manchester 7.7. Every Greater Manchester area is above the World Health Organization's guideline of 5 µg/m³, as most of England is.

Deprivation

English Indices of Deprivation 2025 (MHCLG), ranked out of 296 English council areas, where 1 is the most deprived. Least deprived in Greater Manchester: Trafford (201), Stockport (158), Bury (90). Most deprived: Manchester (4), Oldham (11), Rochdale (17). Manchester is among the 10 most deprived council areas in England.

What the six numbers say together

Manchester has Greater Manchester's highest recorded crime rate, lowest gigabit coverage, most fine particles in the air and most deprivation. Trafford has Greater Manchester's highest average price, fastest-rising prices and least deprivation. Wigan has Greater Manchester's lowest average price and cleanest air. No single measure makes a place right or wrong for you; they tell you what to look at next.

Check a street, not just a district

District figures hide a lot of variation. The free Jackson check reads one postcode for flood risk, recorded crime, noise and the nearest station, and the full league tables for crime, prices, price change, broadband, air and deprivation show where each Greater Manchester area sits across England and Wales. More counties, same six numbers, on the blog. How Jackson scores an area explains the sources.

Data, not advice. Figures are official open data under the Open Government Licence (Ofcom data under Ofcom terms), for England & Wales, with the period shown for each.

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