Approximated social grade (5 categories)

Description: This socio-economic classification is used by the market research and marketing industries to analyse spending habits and consumer attitudes. It is not possible to assign social grade precisely from Census 2021, although the Market Research Society's method provides a good approximation.

Quality information: As Census 2021 was during a unique period of rapid change, take care when using this data for planning purposes. Read more about this https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/methodologies/labourmarketqualityinformationforcensus2021[quality notice].

Comparability with 2011: Broadly comparable. In 2021, an improved methodological approach was used to create this variable. However, as social grade was modelled using different algorithms and variables in 2011 and 2021, it would be misleading to use census outputs to examine trends over this period.

Household composition (19 categories)

Description: Households according to the relationships between members. One-family households are classified by: - the number of dependent children - family type (married, civil partnership or cohabiting couple family, or lone parent family)

Other households are classified by: - the number of people - the number of dependent children - whether the household consists only of students or only of people aged 66 and over

Quality information: There are quality considerations around consistency of census data on household and family composition and legal partnership status, and changes in the definition of "other household types" since 2011.

Comparability with 2011: Broadly comparable. This is derived from the legal partnership status derived variable. We have made changes to reflect that people can now marry someone of the same-sex and people of the opposite-sex can be in a civil partnership.