National Statistics Postcode Directory (NSPD)

The NSPD is a key ONS Geography product and is used by a variety of customers, including central and local government, private industry and academia. It links all current and terminated UK postcodes to the administrative, health and other geographic areas in which the postcodes fall.

Users should note that postcodes which straddle two geographic areas will be assigned to the area where the mean grid reference of all the addresses within the postcode falls.

The NSPD is a Gridlink® branded product which pulls together data from members of the Gridlink® Consortium (Royal Mail, Ordnance Survey, General Register Office for Scotland, Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland and ONS).

A list of the fields included in each version is included in the NSPD Order Form, available from the Downloads section.

Information on the latest postcode changes is available on the Royal Mail website.

Product details

The NSPD is released quarterly in February, May, August and November and  NSPD products are supplied with various elements of Postcode Address File (PAF) data depending on the level required. These extracts are available as Full PAF or Part PAF options. Additionally, an ‘Open’ version, containing no PAF elements (and not attracting Royal Mail royalties) is also available.

A list of each version's fields is included in the NSPD Order Form, available from the Downloads section. Samples of the NSPD are also available to download. The samples are taken from May 2010 and are for viewing only.

The NSPD is provided in all the following formats: MS ACCESS, DBF, TXT, and CSV. It is supplied zipped on CD-ROM (containing all formats) or unzipped on DVD-ROM (containing all formats). Version Notes and a User Guide, providing additional information about the product, are included with the NSPD data and can also be downloaded from this page.

Availability and cost

The PAF versions of the NSPD are available either for the whole of the UK, for individual countries or individual Government Office Regions (GORs) with grid references at 1 metre resolution. The ‘Open’ version is available for the UK only. The NSPD can be ordered by completing the order form and returning it to ONS Geography by email.

Users should be aware that revised Royal Mail royalties now apply when using the PAF versions of the NSPD.

Academia

The NSPD is available to download free-of-charge for academic users who have completed the Athens registration process. Registration is only available to those carrying out academic work in UK Higher and Further Education, and some Research Council staff. The NSPD can be accessed via UKBORDERS on the University of Edinburgh website.

For details of current charging for the NSPD please contact us or view the document that can be downloaded from this page.

Details of the Terms and Conditions for Internal Business Use of the NSPD are available in the Downloads section.

Details of the Royal Mail licensing terms can be downloaded from this page.

For other use of the NSPD data, for example website or commercial re-distribution please contact us.

The NSPD Version Notes and User Guide can be downloaded from this page.