WITH ONCE outlandish ideas like virtual reality and the metaverse now coming to life, we’re quickly marching towards a truly digital age. Only it’s not just about our hobbies and how we interact with this new world, but also our jobs and careers. But which cities and towns across the UK seem to be embracing this transition best?
Domains and hosting provider, Fasthosts, has set out to answer this curious question. Using upload and download speeds, 5G connectivity and availability of jobs in the digital space to rank each city accordingly, giving each a weighted score before diving deep into the results to analyse.
These findings gave us a list of the top 10 most “digital” cities in the UK.
Unsurprisingly, the capitals for three of the four countries of the UK make up the top contenders, with only Cardiff unfortunately missing out on a spot on the list. Edinburgh taking the top spot over London was something we didn’t anticipate, but this was down to Edinburgh having both higher upload and download speeds and bagging those extra points. Manchester taking 4th is once again not surprising given its strong cultural roots in music and visual media, however Salford and Bolton breaking the top 10 may require some explanation.
Bolton took home points thanks to its internet speeds, ranking 5th and 7th for download and upload speeds respectively, while Salford had the best ratio of people to jobs, as well as ranking 4th for percentage of jobs that are digital. This can be put down to two main factors – MediaCityUK and its proximity to Manchester.
MediaCityUK is no doubt a large supplier of jobs in the digital sector and there’s inevitably some crossover with some of the roles available in Manchester city centre. This isn’t to put Salford down – it should be seen as a great area of potential and investment for digital-based businesses.
North of the border, Dundee placed third in the rankings for download speeds, while Aberdeen took the top spot for uploads – two results that took us by surprise. This is most likely due to Scotland’s continued investment in the country’s internet infrastructure, with new support being announced as recently as August of this year.
Birmingham is also another name you’d expect to see on this list thanks to its continued support as a northern hub, having good placements for internet speeds as well as coming 8th for job availability. Finally, Leeds rounds out the list at number ten, further emphasising its role as a cultural and digital centre for Yorkshire in an area that’s seeing continual growth, with a list of entertainment and digital institutions choosing to take root there and growing with it.
The Full Top 10:
1 Edinburgh
2 London
3 Belfast
4 Manchester
5 Salford
6 Dundee
7 Aberdeen
8 Birmingham
9 Bolton
10 Leeds
For any more information or a breakdown of the article and its data, the full interactive article can be viewed at – The UK’s Digital Cities | Fasthosts
