Great Britain

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  • Sources: The British dataset is compiled from publicly available sources.
  • Coverage: The country code GB stands for the United Kingdom; the address data covers England.
  • Update frequency: Monthly.
  • Postcodes: alphanumeric: an outward code of 2 to 4 characters and an inward code of 3 characters, separated by a space. In B1 2JB, a postcode in Birmingham city centre, the outward code B1 names the postcode area B and the district B1. The inward code 2JB narrows it down to the sector B1 2 and the unit B1 2JB. A unit postcode typically covers around 15 addresses. Postcodes are accepted in upper or lower case, with or without the space, and returned with the space.

Finding an address

  • Autocomplete needs the postcode, settlement and street, or an addressId.
  • When a request matches several addresses, such as two buildings with one house number, the API returns a 400 that lists their addressId values; pick one by its location or buildingName and repeat the request with that addressId.
  • The locator (/v2/locator/gb) ranks outward codes such as B11 or SW1A, each placed at the mean coordinates of its unit postcodes. The range call (/v2/range/gb) returns full postcodes.

House numbers

  • streetNumber is text: a number such as 1 or a complete range such as 81-87 on John Bright Street in Birmingham. A letter after the number is the premise, such as A in 12A.
  • Addresses go down to the building. Flats within a building are not part of the data.

Address fields

  • settlement: the main town or area of the postcode district, such as Birmingham City Centre.
  • district: the local authority district. It is absent where a unitary authority governs the area.
  • buildingName: the building's name, where the source has one.