County and Unitary Authority Boundaries for England and Wales, December 2016

Office for National Statistics provides digital vector boundaries for Counties and Unitary Authorities in England and Wales as of December 2016. The dataset includes five boundary versions at different resolutions, from full extent to ultra-generalized. It contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.

Use Cases

• Create thematic maps of England and Wales based on the provided administrative boundaries.
• Perform spatial joins with other datasets using the county and unitary authority geographies.
• Generate simplified boundary files for web mapping applications based on the generalized (20m, 200m, 500m) versions.
• Analyze coastal administrative extents using the boundaries clipped to the Mean High Water mark.

Strengths

• Provides five distinct boundary versions, including full resolution (extent of the realm and clipped) and three generalized levels (20m, 200m, 500m).
• File sizes are explicitly listed, ranging from 168 KB for ultra-generalized to 22 MB for full resolution clipped.
• Originates from authoritative sources: Office for National Statistics and Ordnance Survey.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Data is static and reflects the administrative geography as of December 2016; boundaries may have changed.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for large-scale joins.

Provenance

Source

Office for National Statistics and Ordnance Survey.

Collection Method

Official digital vector boundaries produced by national mapping and statistical agencies.

Time Range

December 2016.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-07-08 13:31:23.038635; freshness should be verified as the boundaries are from 2016.

Geography

England and Wales.