The best city in the UK to find love
28 August 2019National survey: the best city in the UK to find love
Oxford, Derry, Plymouth, Bath and Hull - ranked as the five best places in the UK to find love according to new research from vouchercloud.com. Just stay out of Peterborough.
Dating can be hard. Between saving up enough to cobble together a convincing date night and fretting about how many dates to go on before making it official, the whole thing can be a mystery. That's why we commissioned a top-notch survey of 2,000 Brits across the UK who are either looking for love or have successfully found it.
We asked them about everything from how much they spend on a date (finding love) to how many dates they go on once they're in a long-term relationship (quality of love). Then we asked our data analysts to throw it all into their data blender to determine the best city in the UK to fall in love and stay in love.
"So who takes the top spot? Oxford is the stand-out victor, just securing the “best city to find love” crown with a strong showing across cost and the long-term love factor. Nipping at the university city’s heels is Derry in Northern Ireland - the first city in the UK to be awarded City of Culture status. Coming in first place for dates before and after official, the city was only let down by the number of people reportedly in established relationships - 1.3% compared to 6.4% in Oxford.
With the current rankings, we expect Derry to overtake Oxford in the next few years - pretty good going for those Derry Girls and boys.
“I’ll call you”, “Let’s do this again”, and “oh no, I’m washing my hair that night”. All phrases these city-dwellers are (possibly) unfamiliar with.
London, despite ranking near last place in both cost factors, sits at 29th overall with 2% of the average annual salary spent on dating alone. In 29th place overall - between Aberdeen and Glasgow - The City redeemed itself with the long-term relationship categories, placing highly in both.
The worst place to find love, in a landslide ‘victory’, is Peterborough. The romantically challenged denizens place dead last in every cost factor we ranked. Peterborough locals take 10.82 dates on average to decide they like a person enough to become official, at a total cost of £914.67, but only splash out for 2.25 dates per month once they’ve sealed the deal. A dramatic drop in romantic effort.
Dudley and Newport sit at second and third last respectively. As with London, the percentage of salary spent on dating, and the cost of the dates themselves, are high. Beyond that, it takes the longest to get into a relationship in these places, and once official, the dating life fizzles out.
Greg Le Tocq, vouchercloud’s founder, commented:
“Dating and finding long-term love doesn’t need to be as expensive and challenging as we’re led to believe. While these rankings show overall trends, by being creative the cost can be kept down to a reasonable level.
“The question has to be asked - what makes our top five so good to date in? Each tend to be situated just outside of major population centres, are near water or beautiful scenery, and are above average for salary expectations. It’s interesting that, contrary to popular opinion, the best places to find long-term love are far outside of the capital cities.
“It’s interesting to see that, despite being perceived as one of the most expensive places to live and work in the UK, London is quite far from last place in the rankings. Without the cost factor holding it back, London would be a far more attractive place to find love.”
Dates don't necessarily need to break the bank... unless you're from Peterborough. To spend a little less and live a little more, we have a whole host of restaurant vouchers available across the UK's best eateries - from Pizza Express and Loch Fyne, to Cafe Rouge and La Tasca.
