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Census 2021

Overall results of the Census 2021

There were 59,597,300 people living in England and Wales on 21 March 2021, the day of the latest census. This is over 3.5 million more (6.3%) than in 2011. Notably, the population of England and Wales is the largest ever recorded.  

The largest population increase was in the East of England, which grew by around 8.3% or 488,000 more residents.   

Information for Rochford

  • In Rochford, the population size has increased by 2.8%
  • This is from around 83,300 in 2011 to 85,600 in 2021
  • At 2.8%, Rochford's population increase is lower than the increase for the East of England (8.3%)
  • This figure is lower than the overall increase for England (6.6%), where the population grew by nearly 3.5 million to 56,489,80.
  • In 2021, Rochford ranked 280th for total population out of 309 local authority areas in England, which is a fall of eight places in a decade
  • As of 2021, Rochford is the 22nd most densely populated of the East of England's 45 local authority areas, with around four people living on each football pitch-sized area of land
  • In Rochford, there has been an increase of 18.7% in people aged 65 years and over
  • There has been a decrease of 1.8% in people aged 15 to 64 years
  • There has been an increase of 1.6% in children aged under 15 years

Neighbouring boroughs

  • Nearby areas like Chelmsford and Basildon have seen their populations increase by around 7.8% and 7.5%, respectively
  • Southend-on-Sea saw an increase of 4.1% 
  • Castle Point saw smaller growth (1.8%)

Source: Census 2021, Office for National Statistics (ONS)

Further information

The Open Geography portal from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) provides free and open access to the definitive source of geographic products, web applications, story maps, services and APIs.

The ONS have a Release Calendar. There will be further data releases during 2022-2023. 

Find out more about Rochford using the ONS tool in the Related Content section.

Find, use and share data about Essex from the 2021 Census on the Essex County Council website