This is a list of thecounties of the United Kingdom. Thehistory of local government in the United Kingdom differs between England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and the subnational divisions within these which have been called counties have varied over time and by purpose. The county has formed the upper tier of local government over much of the United Kingdom at one time or another,[1] and has been used for a variety of other purposes, such as forLord Lieutenants, land registration and postal delivery. This list of 184 counties is split by constituent country, time period and purpose.
| Colour key in tables below |
|---|
| Green: Current official status |
| Yellow: Historical or superseded status |
Changes between the1990s and2009 subdivided the short-livednon-metropolitan counties ofCleveland andHumberside intounitary authorities, but the former county names continue for fire services and police forces (seeNon-metropolitan county § List of non-metropolitan counties). Similarly the short-lived county ofAvon provides part of the area and name ofAvon and Somerset Police and its area is roughly that of theAvon Fire and Rescue Service.
The historic counties ofYorkshire,Cumberland,Westmorland,Huntingdonshire andMiddlesex are the five defunct ceremonial counties which were historically counties. With their abolition as ceremonial counties, Yorkshire is divided for that purpose into the East Riding of Yorkshire, North Yorkshire, South Yorkshire and West Yorkshire. Cumberland and Westmorland were combined with a former exclave ofLancashire to formCumbria,Huntingdonshire merged intoCambridgeshire, and the vastly greater part ofMiddlesex became part ofGreater London.
Contemporary reference to theIsle of Ely and nearbySoke of Peterborough has been very rare since the early 20th century and they have scant public resonance. The counties marked in italics below are neither ceremonial nor historic.
The list does not include the 61county boroughs (1889–1974) or the 18counties corporate (before 1889), each of which was an administrative county for a single town or city, within a larger "county-at-large".
| County | Current lieutenancy[11] | Postal before 1996[4] | 1899–1973 | Before 1899 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| County | Administrative | ||||
| Antrim |  |  | | | |
| Armagh | | | | | |
| City ofBelfast | | Special post town | CB[12] | | Part of counties Antrim and Down |
| Down | | | | | |
| Fermanagh | | | | | |
| Londonderry | | | | | |
| City ofDerry | | Special post town | CB[12] | | Part of County Londonderry |
| Tyrone | | | | | |
| County | Lieutenancy | Registration[13] | Postal before 1996[4] | 1890–1975 | Before 1890 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| City ofAberdeen | | Special post town | 1900 | ||
| Aberdeenshire | | | | | |
| Angus (Forfarshire) | | | | | |
| Argyll | | | | | |
| Ayrshire | | | | | |
| Banffshire | | | | | |
| Berwickshire | | | | | |
| Bute | | | | | |
| Caithness | | | | | |
| Clackmannanshire | | | | | |
| Cromartyshire | | ||||
| Dumfriesshire | | | | | |
| Dunbartonshire (Dumbarton) | | | | | |
| City ofDundee | | Special post town | 1894 | ||
| East Lothian (Haddingtonshire) | | | | | |
| City ofEdinburgh | | Special post town | | | |
| Fife | | | | | |
| City ofGlasgow | | | Special post town | 1893 | |
| Inverness-shire | | | | | |
| Kincardineshire | | | | | |
| Kinross-shire | | | | | |
| Kirkcudbrightshire | | | | | |
| Lanarkshire | | | | | |
| Midlothian (County of Edinburgh) | | | | | |
| Moray (Elginshire) | | | | | |
| Nairnshire | | | | | |
| Orkney | | | | | |
| Peeblesshire | | | | | |
| Perthshire | | | | | |
| Renfrewshire | | | | | |
| Ross and Cromarty | | | | ||
| Ross-shire | | | |||
| Roxburghshire | | | | | |
| Selkirkshire | | | | | |
| Shetland (Zetland) | | | | | |
| Stirlingshire | | | | | |
| Sutherland | | | | | |
| West Lothian (Linlithgowshire) | | | | | |
| Wigtownshire | | | | | |