What is the difference between an AONB and a National Landscape?

They are the same statutory designation. Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty in England and Wales were rebranded as National Landscapes over 2023 and 2024. The legal basis under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 did not change. We keep the national term on each record and group all of them under one landscape category.

Which nations are covered?

All four. England and Wales hold AONBs and National Landscapes, Scotland holds National Scenic Areas, and Northern Ireland holds AONBs. The dataset has 88 designations in total.

What is a National Scenic Area?

It is Scotland's equivalent designation, made under the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 and held by NatureScot. There are 40 of them. We carry them under the same landscape category as AONBs and National Landscapes, with the Scottish term preserved.

Where does the data come from and how is it licensed?

From the four statutory custodians: Natural England, NatureScot, Natural Resources Wales with the Welsh Government, and DAERA's Northern Ireland Environment Agency. Every record is published under the Open Government Licence v3.0 and returns the custodian's attribution, so commercial reuse is clean.

Is the boundary geometry usable on a map?

Yes. Every designation carries valid EPSG:4326 (WGS84) geometry, reprojected server-side from British National Grid. You can query by point, radius, bounding box or polygon, and intersect a site boundary directly.

Is a protected landscape the same as a National Park?

No. National Parks are a separate designation with their own authorities and are not included here. This product covers AONBs, National Landscapes and National Scenic Areas only.

How is it delivered and priced?

Read-only over REST at /v1/conservation. You query by point, radius, bounding box, polygon or stable id. It is an annual licence rather than pay-per-call, and the /types vocabulary endpoint is free so you can evaluate first.

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National Landscapes and AONBs

Every UK protected scenic landscape in one schema: 88 AONBs, National Landscapes and National Scenic Areas from Natural England, NatureScot, NRW and DAERA.

Protected landscapes

Nations

EPSG:4326

Coordinate system

OGL v3.0

Licence

Overview

About this dataset

National Landscapes and AONBs covers every protected scenic landscape in the United Kingdom: 88 designations across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty was renamed a National Landscape in England and Wales over 2023 and 2024; Scotland uses National Scenic Areas. We hold all three under one schema so you can read the whole country in a single query.

The designations rest on three statutes. The Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 governs AONBs and National Landscapes in England and Wales. The Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 governs National Scenic Areas. The Nature Conservation and Amenity Lands (Northern Ireland) Order 1985 governs Northern Ireland's AONBs. The custodians are Natural England (34), NatureScot (40), Natural Resources Wales with the Welsh Government (6) and DAERA's Northern Ireland Environment Agency (8).

We harmonise the AONB, National Landscape and National Scenic Area labels under one landscape category, while keeping each record's national term so nothing is flattened or mislabelled. Every designation carries a stable identifier, valid EPSG:4326 (WGS84) geometry reprojected from British National Grid, and the name of the body that designated it. Query by point, radius, bounding box or polygon over REST, or fetch a single landscape by id.

Each record returns under the Open Government Licence v3.0 with per-custodian attribution, so commercial reuse stays clean. Use it to test whether a site or address sits inside a protected landscape, to flag a planning constraint early, or to screen a portfolio against the UK's designated landscapes. The free /types endpoint lists the public vocabulary, so you can evaluate before you commit to a licence.

What's included

Everything in the box

Spatial constraint queries

Ask whether a point, address or site polygon falls inside a protected landscape. Query by point, radius, bounding box or polygon, or fetch one designation by its stable id.

Harmonised landscape category

AONB, National Landscape and National Scenic Area sit under one landscape category, while each record keeps its national term so a Scottish National Scenic Area is never relabelled as an English National Landscape.

Four registers, one identity

The four national registers reconcile into one schema with a single stable identifier per designation, so cross-nation queries return one consistent shape.

EPSG:4326 geometry

Every landscape carries valid EPSG:4326 (WGS84) geometry, reprojected server-side from British National Grid, ready to map or intersect without further transformation.

OGL provenance on every record

Each designation returns under the Open Government Licence v3.0 with the named custodian's attribution, so reuse in a commercial product is auditable.

Welsh bilingual names

Welsh National Landscapes carry their official Welsh name in name_cy alongside the English name.

Data fields

What each record carries

schema14 fields

id: string// Stable identifier in the form design.{product}.{nation}.{type}.{reference}.

reference: string// Source reference for the designation within its national register.

nation: enum// Nation code for the register the designation belongs to: ENG, SCT, WAL or NIR.

name: string// Official designation name as published by the custodian.

name_cy: string// Official Welsh name, where the custodian publishes one; null otherwise.

designation_type: enum// The national term: national_landscape, national_scenic_area or area_of_outstanding_natural_beauty.

category: enum// Harmonised category grouping all three national terms.

source: string// Custodian that maintains the source register.

designated_date: date// Date the area was first designated, served at the precision of the source.

date_precision: enum// Precision of the served dates so a year-only source value is never read as an exact day: day, month, year or none.

area_hectares: float// Designated area in hectares, where the custodian records one.

centroid: object// Representative point for the designation in EPSG:4326, as lat and lng.

licence: string// Licence the record is served under; Open Government Licence v3.0 throughout.

attribution: string// Per-custodian attribution string to display when the record is reused.

Sample response

Straight from the API

response.jsonapplication/json

{
  "id": "design.conservation.ENG.national_landscape.cotswolds",
  "reference": "cotswolds",
  "nation": "ENG",
  "source": "Natural England",
  "name": "Cotswolds National Landscape",
  "name_cy": null,
  "designation_type": "national_landscape",
  "category": "landscape",
  "designated_date": "1966-12-15",
  "amended_date": "1990-11-21",
  "date_precision": "day",
  "local_authority": "Gloucestershire",
  "area_hectares": 203800,
  "source_url": "https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/national-landscapes",
  "centroid": {
    "lat": 51.83,
    "lng": -1.85
  },
  "licence": "OGL-UK-3.0",
  "attribution": "Contains Natural England data © Natural England, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0."
}

Use cases

What people build with it

Site appraisal and due diligence

Before acquiring or promoting land, check whether the site sits in a National Landscape or National Scenic Area, where stricter design and scale tests apply to development.

Developers

Planning constraint checks

Add a national landscape layer to constraint reports and call screening, so a designation is flagged at the same time as listed buildings and conservation areas.

Planners

Lending security assessment

Identify whether the property securing a loan sits inside a protected landscape, where permitted development and future extension are more tightly controlled.

Lenders

Valuation context

Give surveyors the designation status behind a view or setting, so a Red Book valuation reflects the planning constraints a protected landscape carries.

Surveyors

Listing and search enrichment

Tag properties and search results with their protected-landscape status, using one identifier that resolves the same way across all four nations.

PropTech