Greater Manchester Built-up Area

Greater Manchester Built-up Area
Conurbation
Left to right: Rochdale and Sale Manchester and Bolton Stockport and Salford Bury, Oldham and Ashton-under-Lyne
A map of the Greater Manchester Built-up Area according to the 2011 census, with Travel to Work Areas overlaid. Manchester is highlighted in orange
Coordinates: 53°30′N 2°18′W / 53.5°N 2.3°W / 53.5; -2.3
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Constituent country	England
Largest settlements	(Pop. 100,000+) Manchester Bolton Sale Rochdale Stockport Salford
Population  (2021 census)
• Conurbation	3,009,684
• Rank	2nd
• Urban	2,720,316
Time zone	UTC+0 (GMT)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+1 (BST)
Postcode	BL, M, OL, SK, WA, WN
Area codes	01204, 01457, 0161, 01625, 01706, 01925, 01942

The Greater Manchester Built-up Area is an area of land defined by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), consisting of the large conurbation that encompasses the urban element of the city of Manchester and the metropolitan area that forms much of Greater Manchester in North West England. According to the United Kingdom Census 2011, the Greater Manchester Built-up Area has a population of 2,553,379^[1] making it the second most populous conurbation in the United Kingdom after the Greater London Built-up Area. This was an increase of 14% from the population recorded at the United Kingdom Census 2001 of 2,240,230, when it was known as the Greater Manchester Urban Area.^[2]

The Greater Manchester Built-up Area is not conterminous with Greater Manchester, a metropolitan county of the same name (and, until 1974, part of the counties of Lancashire, Cheshire and Yorkshire) for it excludes settlements such as Wigan and Marple from Greater Manchester, but includes hinterland settlements which lie outside its statutory boundaries, such as Wilmslow in Cheshire, Glossop in Derbyshire, Whitworth in Lancashire and Newton-le-Willows in Merseyside.