Which census are free to view

They are also available online from the National Archive's official partner sites Ancestry. With regards to accessing census data from on, the information that the Office for National Statistics holds is subject to the provisions of the Statistics and Registration Service Act These provisions state that we are unable to disclose personal census information while it remains in the custody of the UK Statistics Authority. Current Government policy is that the UK Statistics Authority should retain all census returns from the Census onwards, for years.

However, the exact details vary depending on the type of schedule, the year, and the location. There were specific instructions on recording extra details for several occupations; notably the professions, the armed forces, public servants and anyone involved in agriculture or manufacturing.

Gentleman — Usually denotes someone living on an income from investments, or retired from business, but has no official definition. J — journeyman; someone who had completed an apprenticeship but was not a master with a business and apprentices of their own. Pensioner — usually means an army pensioner; other types of pensioner are generally identified as such, including Greenwich Pensioner naval pensioner , police pensioner and so on.

There are many reasons that explain why you might not find somebody in the census. You can use The National Archives catalogue to find out which parishes or districts are known to be missing from the census. The census returns for the whole registration district of Wrexham, Denbighshire, were believed to be missing.

However, the original enumeration books for the town of Wrexham were discovered in a bookshop, and are now deposited in the Denbighshire Archives. As with the census, you can use our catalogue to search the record series for any other census year to find out about whole parishes or districts that are known to be missing, but compared to there is less detail about odd missing pages.

For more guidance on how to search our catalogue, read Discovery search help. Although most people now access the census online, and not on microfilm, census references are still very useful. Search engines on websites vary, and they can also change over time, but the original National Archives references never change. If you have a full reference, you can use it to find a page on Ancestry. This is particularly useful when a person can be found using a name search on one site, but not on another, due to differences in transcription.

You may find census references quoted in books and articles, and you will also need to know how to use them if you are consulting our online and hard-copy street indexes see section 4. A census reference has three main elements; a department letter code, a series number, and a piece number. The department and series codes for each census year are:. A piece may contain hundreds of pages, so extra information is required to find the right place within a piece. The census returns for most years follow a single format, but there are slightly different arrangements for and The extra refererence is a folio number and optionally a page number.

Each piece contains several enumeration books with numbered pages. Later, folio numbers were stamped on the top right corner of every right-hand page, starting at the beginning of the piece and continuing through all the enumeration books. Since folio numbers appear only on alternate pages, each folio represents the page where it appears and the following page. Therefore a series, piece and folio reference enables you to locate the correct pair of pages but a page number can be added to the reference to identify a single page, if required, as in this example from the census:.

Both Ancestry. Each book then contains its own series of folio numbers. For the first time the household schedules were kept, instead of being copied into enumeration books.

Institutions and vessels do not have schedule numbers, instead the information was recorded directly into special enumeration books with numbered pages, as in previous census years. Indexes to the Scottish censuses are also available on Ancestry. None of these indexes has links to digitised images. Unfortunately, few 19th-century Irish census returns have survived; most were lost when the Public Record Office was destroyed in the fire at the Four Courts in Dublin Only the and censuses survived, along with a very small number of earlier returns.

Censuses were also taken in many British colonies on the same dates as in the United Kingdom. Surviving records of these will normally be found in the country of origin, and not in The National Archives.

The only exceptions to this are:. Access census street indexes in our Web Archive. As with all content in the UK Government Web Archive , these are archived pages that are no longer edited or updated. Browse Vision of Britain for reports based on information from censuses up to , or search for census data relating to a town or district. Consult The Online Historical Population Reports for online access to the complete population reports for Britain and Ireland from to and extensive background information, including examples of documents.

Use our library catalogue to find a recommended book list. You may also be able to find them in a local library. Search our blogs for posts relating to the census.

Watch the video Census records: an introduction by Audrey Collins. A census is a complete population count for a given area or place taken on a specific date. The census is considered to be the first modern UK census. Find your ancestors in the census with the free search available on our website. You will also find some practical information about the UK census and how to use it to research your family history.

Free Search. Within the England, Wales and Scotland census, you will find transcribed images of the original census pages plus clear images of the original census enumeration books.

To find out more about census records read our Getting Started with Census Records article. Discover tips, expert advice, getting started guides and more on the Findmypast blog.

Explore more free records on Findmypast including Parish records and Military records.