The Best UK Cities To Host Your Wedding

Organising a wedding is no easy task – beyond just securing the dream venue, the countless cogs that have to work perfectly on the day itself can be a huge stress factor. 

Your big day needs a florist, a photographer, a caterer, a makeup artist and more – and we’ve not even got to thinking about the all-important wedding cake yet!

Whether you want to stay local or travel to a more picturesque corner of the UK for your big day, a healthy selection of specialist wedding services and venues is vital to ensuring everything goes smoothly.

We do what we can to make securing the perfect engagement rings and wedding bands as stress-free as it can be – but we know that a wedding comes with so much more to think about than just the jewellery.

With this in mind, we’ve compiled a guide to the best UK cities to host your wedding – factoring in a bride and groom’s options when it comes to venues and services in each city according to listings on Guides for Brides.

And we all know the weather on your wedding day can be make or break – and with British weather notoriously fickle, we’ve even gone on to rank the cities across all four seasons to give you the best chance of blue skies and sunshine when you tie the knot.

Top 10 Cities For A UK Wedding

Considering the options available for venues and key wedding day services, the best UK city to get married in is Oxford, with a total of 328 established wedding venues in and around the city.

Oxford also scores highly for the number of wedding day service providers catering to happy couples in the area, notably leading the nation when it comes to bridal hair and makeup services - 257 hair stylists and makeup artists cater to Oxford weddings.

When it comes to availability of wedding day services, the top 10 cities are:

Coming in at 4th overall, Manchester takes the top spot for number of wedding venues, with 365 in and around the city. Couples will also find the highest number of wedding photographers catering to Manchester weddings – 227 in total.

Oxford tops the list when it comes to options for florists (137) and wedding caterers (120) – While 2nd placed Birmingham has the most bakers ready and waiting to make the wedding cake you always dreamed of.

Best Cities by Season

It’s no secret that British weather can be temperamental, and good weather can make all the difference on your wedding day.

We’ve analysed Met Office data on average temperatures and levels of rainfall – it’s all well and good if your chosen city has great options for wedding services, but if it’s raining more often than not? Unideal.

When factoring in the average temperatures and rainfall levels across each season, the rankings change – which may affect your chosen wedding destination depending on the time you plan to exchange vows.

Oxford continues to top the list year-round – with the best combination of temperature and lower levels of rain in all four seasons ensuring the best chance of the weather being on your side whenever you choose to have your wedding.

Weighting the ranking by Met Office data, the top 5 cities for weddings in each season are:

While Oxford is a safe bet year-round – Milton Keynes ends up a better destination overall than Birmingham if you want a spring wedding, while Southampton actually falls down the ranking in summer.

UK Regional Wedding Guide

North West

Manchester tops the list for North West weddings, owing largely to the number of venues and service providers compared to neighbouring cities. Notoriously rainy weather knocks Manchester out of the top 5 across every season.

Yorkshire

Those looking to have a Yorkshire wedding may be surprised to note that the picturesque cathedral city York is only the 20th best city to have a wedding in when factoring in venues, services and weather. It’s beaten out by Sheffield, Leeds, and Bradford for Yorkshire cities across all four seasons.

East Midlands

Leicester and Derby tie in the rankings owing to a large crossover of service providers, and the picture stays largely the same for the two cities in relation to the rest of the country when factoring in seasonal weather changes.

West Midlands

Birmingham tops the charts for those looking to get married in the West Midlands, with the best seasons to have a Birmingham wedding being Summer, Autumn or Winter, where it’s second in the national rankings. It falls to 3rd in Winter when the city is let down by higher levels of rain compared to some other regions.

East Anglia

Peterborough beats out Norwich for weddings in East Anglia owing to more options for wedding day services. Norwich does beat Peterborough on the number of venues (111 vs 103), but neither city performs particularly well compared to the national picture. 

Warm average temperatures and low levels of rainfall aren’t enough to pull East Anglian cities up the rankings. When it comes to venues and services, Peterborough comes 21st out of the 31 cities compared while Norwich comes 24th.

South East

The South East dominates the top 10 with cities such as Oxford, Milton Keynes, Southampton and Brighton well served when it comes to venues and services and performing well against much of the nation when factoring in weather.

South West

Bristol is the best performing city in the South West, ranking 8th across all four seasons. With 293 wedding venues in and around the city, and performing slightly above average when it comes to the availability of wedding day services.

Plymouth disappoints, ranking as the worst English city in Summer and Autumn weddings.

Scotland

Scottish cities are let down by colder temperatures and more rainfall. Glasgow is the Scottish city best-served by venues and service providers, but sits 23rd when it comes to the UK-wide ranking.

Aberdeen sits at the bottom of the UK wide ranking with the lowest score for wedding venues and services in the city. Dundee performs just marginally better to sit 30th in the UK ranking.