Wedding venue hotspots and deserts: how far is the next approved venue?

Key findings

• Half of the 4,188 in-date approved wedding venues we could place on a map are within 1.58 km (0.98 miles) of another approved venue. 38.7% have another within 1 km, 88.7% within 5 km and 99.2% within 10 km.
• The most isolated is The Hive in Westmorland and Furness: the nearest other approved venue, Melmerby Hall, is 17.9 km (11.1 miles) away in a straight line. Next come Nant Y Walch Barn in Powys (17.1 km) and The Brigands Inn in Gwynedd (14.6 km).
• The densest spot is Soho: 43 other approved venues lie within 1 km of The Union Soho, and 197 within 5 km. Outside London, the Manchester and Salford cluster is the tightest, with up to 50 venues inside a 5 km radius.
• The wedding venue postcode with the most approvals is LA23, around Windermere in the Lake District, with 17. It beats central Newcastle (NE1, 16), Bristol (BS1, 15) and Bath (BA1, 14).
• Among the 108 council areas with at least 10 venues, North Lincolnshire is the most spread out (median 4.93 km to the next venue, and none of its 11 has another within 2 km), followed by Central Bedfordshire (3.75 km) and Cumberland (3.68 km). Islington (0.12 km) and Westminster (0.13 km) are the most packed.
• By region, venues in the East of England are the furthest apart (median 2.3 km). London is the closest (0.28 km, with 92.4% of venues having another within 2 km), then the North East (1.05 km).

How close is the nearest other approved venue?

For each of the 4,188 in-date venues with a mappable postcode, we found the closest other in-date venue on the list and measured the straight-line distance between them.

So more than a third of venues have a rival approved venue within a kilometre, often on the same street. 79 full postcodes are shared by two or more approved venues (163 venues in all, up to 3 on one postcode), usually a hotel and its neighbour, or two rooms in one building approved separately.

The most isolated approved venues

These venues are the furthest from any other in-date approved venue. If you want a ceremony venue with no neighbour on the list for miles, start here.

Distances are between postcode centre points, not front doors. The national list gives The Hive’s address as Nenthead, Cumbria (CA9 3PF), followed by a second address in Bardsea; we used the Nenthead postcode.

The densest clusters

Central London has the tightest cluster of approved venues anywhere in England and Wales: private members’ clubs, hotels and livery halls a few streets apart.

Outside London the busiest 5 km circles are in Salford and Manchester, where venues such as Hemsley House, Salford Lads And Girls Club, The Black Friar, Abode Manchester each have 49 to 50 other approved venues within 5 km.

Postcode districts with the most approved venues

A postcode district is the first half of a postcode, such as LA23 or BS1. Rural honeypots sit beside city centres at the top.

1,584 postcode districts have at least one in-date approved venue. “Main town” is the town named most often in those venues’ addresses on the list, shown only where it covers at least 40% of them.

By region: median distance to the next venue

Most spread out and most packed council areas

Council areas with at least 10 in-date venues, ranked by the median distance from each venue to its nearest approved neighbour.

Most spread out

Most packed

Somerset stands out among big rural counties: only 11.8% of its 51 mapped venues have another approved venue within 2 km. York is the exception among cathedral cities, with a median of just 0.2 km.

All 108 council areas with 10 or more venues

Click a column heading to sort.

The CSV covers all 175 council areas, including those with fewer than 10 venues.

What it means if you are planning a wedding

If you love a venue that turns out to be booked, there is usually another approved venue close by: for half of venues the next one is under 1 mile away. In the most spread-out areas, such as North Lincolnshire, Cumberland and Gwynedd, plan travel for guests between ceremony and reception if they are at different places. Browse every approved venue by county or council area, or check an approval’s end date on our approvals ending soon page.

Methodology

• Venues: GOV.UK, “Civil marriages and partnerships: approved premises list” (data table, file last updated 17 October 2025). Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
• In date: an entry counts if the approval end date on the list is on or after 2 Nov 2026: 4,218 venues. We did not change or estimate any date.
• Location: each venue’s postcode was matched to its postcode centre point and council area using ONS geography via postcodes.io. 30 in-date venues could not be placed and are left out of the distance figures, which cover 4,188 venues. 19 had no postcode we could read and are left out of the postcode district counts.
• Distance: great-circle (straight-line) distance between postcode centre points, Earth radius 6,371 km. Road distances are longer. Venues that share a postcode are 0 km apart.
• Neighbours: only other in-date venues on the national list count. Register offices and religious buildings, which do not need this approval, are not on the list.

Cite this data

Approved Venues (2026), “Wedding venue hotspots and deserts: how far is the next approved venue?”, https://approvedvenues.co.uk/guides/wedding-venue-hotspots-2026, analysis of the GOV.UK approved premises list (updated 17 October 2025), status as at 2 Nov 2026. You are welcome to reuse the figures, CSVs and chart with a link to this page. Questions or corrections: hello@approvedvenues.co.uk.

See also: approved venues in numbers, 2026 · registrar fees by council · approvals ending soon · all counties · for venues