British Chinese

For Chinese people with British ancestry, see Britons in China.
British Chinese
Distribution by local authority in the 2011 census.
Total population
United Kingdom United Kingdom: 502,216 – 0.8% (2021/22 Census)
 England: 431,188 – 0.8% (2021)[1]
 Scotland: 47,075 – 0.9% (2022)[2]
 Wales: 14,458 – 0.5% (2021)[1]
Northern Ireland: 9,495 – 0.5% (2021)[3]
Regions with significant populations
Languages
British English, Cantonese, Mandarin, Min, Hakka, Malay
Religion
Predominantly irreligious (62.6%);
minority follows Christianity (17.2%), Buddhism (9.3%), and other faiths (1.1%)[a]
2021 census, NI, England and Wales only[4][5]
Related ethnic groups
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British Chinese (traditional Chinese: 英籍華人; simplified Chinese: 英籍华人; pinyin: Yīng jí huárén), also known as Chinese British or Chinese Britons, are people of Chinese – particularly Han Chinese – ancestry who reside in the United Kingdom, constituting the second-largest group of Overseas Chinese in Western Europe after France.[6][7]

The United Kingdom has the oldest Chinese community in Western Europe. The first waves of immigrants came between 1842 (the end of the First Opium War) and the 1940s (the end of World War II), largely through treaty ports opened as concessions to the British for the Opium Wars, such as Guangzhou, Tianjin, and Shanghai.[8] British Chinese communities began to form in British ports in Liverpool, London, Cardiff, and Glasgow. In the Liverpool area, by the end of World War II, an estimated 900 Eurasian children were born to Chinese fathers and white mothers.[9][10]

Since the middle of the 20th century, many British Chinese have been descended from people of former British colonies, such as Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore. This shifted in the late-1970s with new waves of Chinese migrants coming from Vietnam, mainland China, and Hong Kong.[11] Following new national security laws imposed by China onto Hong Kong, the United Kingdom offered a pathway to citizenship for British National (Overseas) status holders residing in Hong Kong – the majority of whom are ethnically Chinese.[12] Two years since the introduction of the BN(O) visa immigration route in 2021, 144,500 Hong Kongers have arrived in the United Kingdom.[13]

According to the 2021 Census, the Chinese ethnic group numbered 502,216, or 0.8% of the United Kingdom population.[14] British Chinese live in every major British city, most notably including London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds, Sheffield and Cambridge. Compared with most other ethnic minorities in the UK, the Chinese are amongst the most geographically dispersed. The six cities of Birmingham, Glasgow, Liverpool, London, Manchester, and Newcastle upon Tyne host Chinatowns.

Overall, as a demographic group, the British Chinese are amongst the highest income earners, the highest academic achievers and the least likely to receive any welfare support from the government. They also place well on socioeconomic metrics with the lowest arrest and incarceration rates, lowest overweight or obesity rates, and the lowest school suspension rates.[15]

  1. ^ a b "Ethnic group, England and Wales: Census 2021". Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 29 November 2022.
  2. ^ "Scotland's Census 2022 – Ethnic group, national identity, language and religion – Chart data". Scotland's Census. National Records of Scotland. 21 May 2024. Retrieved 21 May 2024. Alternative URL 'Search data by location' > 'All of Scotland' > 'Ethnic group, national identity, language and religion' > 'Ethnic Group'
  3. ^ "MS-B01: Ethnic group". Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. 22 September 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2023.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference ReligionNI2021 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ "RM031 Ethnic group by religion". Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 28 March 2023.
  6. ^ "Selected countries with the largest number of overseas Chinese 2022". Statista. September 2023. Retrieved 9 July 2024.
  7. ^ Poston, Dudley L.; Wong, Juyin Helen (2016). "The Chinese diaspora: The current distribution of the overseas Chinese population". Chinese Journal of Sociology. 2 (3): 348–373. doi:10.1177/2057150X16655077.
  8. ^ Benton & Gomez 2007, pp. 22–31.
  9. ^ Cite error: The named reference halfandhalf was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  10. ^ "Liverpool Chinatown History". Liverpool Chinatown. Archived from the original on 15 October 2022. Retrieved 29 October 2015.
  11. ^ "UK Chinese". 23 January 2006. Archived from the original on 24 May 2012. Retrieved 22 June 2013.
  12. ^ "Hong Kong security law: Why we are taking our BNOs and leaving". BBC News. 2020-07-11. Retrieved 2021-05-23.
  13. ^ "'We are all thinking about how to contribute': Hongkongers boost Britain's suburbs". Financial Times. 29 May 2023. Retrieved 21 August 2023.
  14. ^ "Population of England and Wales". www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk. 22 December 2022. Retrieved 18 March 2023.
  15. ^ "Ethnicity facts and figures". service.gov.uk. Race Disparity Unit. Retrieved 25 May 2023.


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