Norfolk towns and villages: the 46 places we cover

By James Ward Money and Property Finance Editor Sep 4, 2026 · Updated Oct 2, 2026

6 min read

We cover 46 places in Norfolk: the city of Norwich, four large towns, 21 market towns, nine suburbs of Norwich and 11 villages. The tables below list them all with their 2021 Census populations, and each name links to its guide.

Each population is one of two kinds of figure, and the tables say which. A parish figure counts everyone inside the civil parish boundary, including outlying farms and hamlets. A built-up area figure is the Office for National Statistics’ count of people living in continuously built-up land, which it maps from satellite imagery without regard to parish lines. The two can differ a good deal. The parish of Diss had 10,714 residents, its built-up area 9,600. Watton goes the other way: the ONS put its built-up area at 11,545, against 8,964 in the parish, because the housing runs past the parish boundary. Norwich, King’s Lynn, Great Yarmouth and Gorleston have no parish at all, so for them we give the built-up area.

Norwich

Norwich is Norfolk’s only city. The ONS counted 200,770 people in the Norwich built-up area in 2021. The city council’s own area had about 144,000; the rest of the built-up area is suburbs such as Sprowston, Hellesdon and Thorpe St Andrew, which the ONS counts as part of Norwich rather than as places of their own. The next-largest place in the county, King’s Lynn, has fewer than a quarter as many people.

Guide: Living in Norwich.

The four large towns

These are the four largest places in Norfolk after Norwich.

The market towns

These are the towns the surrounding villages use for shopping, doctors and schools. We list them alphabetically. They range from Hingham, with 2,543 residents, to Dereham, with 19,256.

Norwich suburbs

These nine are separate parishes in Broadland or South Norfolk, outside Norwich City Council’s area, and all are within about six miles of the city centre. Several are larger than most market towns. Sprowston had 17,126 residents in 2021. Costessey had 16,679, up from 12,463 in 2011; its Queen’s Hills estate had 4,463 residents in 2021, against 92 in 2001. In the ONS built-up area figures, Sprowston, Hellesdon and Thorpe St Andrew are counted inside Norwich, while Taverham and Drayton together form one built-up area of 14,985.

Villages and the Broads

The 11 villages we cover in detail are there because each has something a buyer needs to understand: a railway station on the Wherry Lines at Brundall, the Broads at Wroxham, the new housing at Rackheath, the eroding cliffs at Happisburgh, or Burnham Market, where about half the homes are not anyone’s main residence.

What the list leaves out

Norfolk has 538 civil parishes, plus the unparished areas of Norwich, King’s Lynn, Great Yarmouth and Gorleston. We cover the city, the towns that still work as centres, the Norwich commuter belt, and villages whose property market or setting needs explaining. Some sizeable places are not on it yet. Bradwell, beside Gorleston, had 11,630 residents in its built-up area in 2021, more than most of the market towns above.

Where to go next

If you already know which place you are considering, go straight to its guide. To narrow a longer list, the compare-towns tool sets two towns side by side on prices, schools, commute and crime, and the five-question shortlist suggests two or three matches. For a ranking by size, see Norfolk towns by population 2026. For postcode districts, Royal Mail post towns and which district council covers each place, see Norfolk postcodes and councils.

Methodology

Populations are usual residents at the 2021 Census and match the figures in each place’s guide. Built-up area figures are from the ONS dataset “Towns and cities, characteristics of built-up areas”, released on 2 August 2023 (table 1c). Parish figures are the ONS 2021 Census parish counts, via Nomis and citypopulation.de. The ONS publishes its built-up area table rounded to the nearest five, which is why every built-up area figure here ends in 0 or 5. The parish count of 538 is the number of Norfolk parishes in the ONS 2021 Census parish profiles, which use 2022 boundaries.

Frequently asked questions

How many towns are in Norfolk?

There is no official list. We treat 25 places as towns: the four large towns and 21 market towns listed above. Several Norwich suburbs, such as Sprowston and Costessey, are larger than most of them.

How many cities are in Norfolk?

One. Norwich is the only place in Norfolk with city status. Its built-up area had 200,770 residents at the 2021 Census.

What is Norfolk’s largest town after Norwich?

King’s Lynn, with 47,615 residents in its built-up area in 2021. Great Yarmouth is next with 28,985, then Thetford with 25,241 in the parish and Gorleston-on-Sea with 24,470.

How many villages does Norfolk have?

Norfolk has 538 civil parishes, and most of them are villages or groups of hamlets. We cover 11 villages in their own guides, plus nine suburban parishes around Norwich.

Are all Norfolk’s suburbs part of Norwich?

Not for council purposes. Sprowston, Hellesdon, Thorpe St Andrew, Drayton and Taverham are in Broadland, and Costessey, Cringleford, Hethersett and Poringland in South Norfolk, so their council tax, bins and planning are handled by those councils. In the ONS built-up area figures, Sprowston, Hellesdon and Thorpe St Andrew are counted as part of Norwich.

Sources

• Office for National Statistics, “Towns and cities, characteristics of built-up areas, England and Wales: Census 2021” (released 2 August 2023): ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/housing/datasets/townsandcitiescharacteristicsofbuiltupareasenglandandwalescensus2021
• ONS Census 2021 population change by local authority: ons.gov.uk/visualisations/censuspopulationchange
• ONS Census 2021 parish profiles, via Nomis: nomisweb.co.uk/sources/census_2021_pp
• ONS parish counts, as compiled by City Population: citypopulation.de/en/uk/eastofengland

By James Ward, Norfolk Living Guide. Contributors write under editorial pseudonyms; see our about page for how the site is edited.

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