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Publication - Research and analysis

Scottish Islands Data Overview (2025)

Published
9 September 2025
From
Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and Islands
Directorate
Environment and Forestry Directorate, +1 more … Agriculture and Rural Economy Directorate
Topic
Arts, culture and sport, Children and families, Communities and third sector, +11 more … Cost of living crisis, Economy, Education, Energy, Environment and climate change, Farming and rural, Health and social care, Housing, Marine and fisheries, Transport, Work and skills
ISBN
9781806431328

The Scottish Islands Data Dashboard has been updated following a review of available data. This report summarises the findings. It highlights changes between data available in 2025 and data first collated in 2023 and gives an overview of longer term trends in Scotland's Islands.

View supporting documents Supporting documents

2 Island Geographies

2.1 Local Authority Island geography

Scotland is divided into 32 administrative areas for the purposes of local government. According to the Islands (Scotland) Act (2018), there are six local authorities which contain inhabited, offshore islands.

Shetland Islands Council, Orkney Islands Council, and Comhairle nan Eilean Siar are local authorities which are completely made up of islands. However, Argyll and Bute Council, Highland Council and North Ayrshire Council encompass a significant amount of mainland in addition to islands.

It is therefore important to note that the majority of the population in Argyll and Bute Council, Highland Council and North Ayrshire Council is not island based. As such, local authority statistics should be interpreted with caution.

Figure 1: Percentage breakdown of the populations of Scottish local authorities containing island and mainland populations
Left: Pie chart showing that 16% of the population of Argyll and Bute Council are islanders. Middle: Pie chart showing that 5% of the population of Highland Council are islanders. Right: Pie chart showing that 4% of the population of North Ayrshire Council are islanders.

Source: Mid-2021 Small Area Population Estimates and the Population Estimates of Scottish Island Regions.

Figure 2: The 32 Local Authority Boundaries in Scotland
Map of 32 Local Authority Boundaries in Scotland.

Source: Scottish Government, 2021

2.2 Scottish Island Regions

The Scottish Island Regions (2023) provide a new geography for grouping Scotland’s islands into nine different regions. Used in the Scottish Islands Survey (2023), it provides an updated version of the James Hutton Institute Scottish Islands Regions (2020) framework that was developed for the National Islands Plan survey (2020). The new Scottish Islands Regions geography is a future-proofed, updated geography that can help to reframe existing data and collect new data, improving understanding of the issues faced by Scotland’s islands.

Notably, some data sources in the dashboard continue to be based on the 2020 geography because updated data using the 2023 geography is unavailable. This is the case for several sections of the dashboard based on questions from the National Islands Plan survey (2020) that were not asked in the Scottish Islands Survey (2023).

Figure 3 : Scottish Island Regions (2023): a new geography for grouping Scotland’s islands
Map of the Scottish Island Regions as revised in 2023.

Source: Scottish Government (2023)

Figure 4 : Scottish National Islands Plan Survey: Subregions
Scottish National Islands Plan Survey: 2020 subregions map showing nine sub-regions.

Source: James Hutton Institute (2020)

This has now been updated with the 2023 geography but continues to be used in some sections of the dashboard where updated data is unavailable.

Contact

Email: socialresearch@scotland.gsi.gov.uk

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