UK’s busiest shared e-scooter hotspots revealed

Portsmouth, Nottingham, Bristol and Liverpool are some of the busiest locations in the UK for shared e-scooters, according to the latest data compiled by Zag.

Zag has analysed its own data, as well as public statements, press releases and datasets from the limited number of e-scooter operators that have made them available.

These estimates help to paint a picture of which of the 40 fleets available across 38 areas in the UK are truly revolutionising how people travel around their neighbourhoods, and which might be gathering a little dust by the roadside.

Top five operations by estimated daily number of journeys on each scooter:

1. Portsmouth (Voi)
2. Nottingham (Wind)
3. Rushden & Higham Ferrers, Northamptonshire (Voi)
4. Newcastle (Neuron)
4. Bournemouth (Beryl)

All of the above have averaged over least six journeys on each scooter per day since their launch.

It’s only been a few days since the launch of Portsmouth, but each scooter is being used almost 10 times a day.

Clearly Portsmouth will be an area ripe for e-scooter fleet growth once the scheme is properly bedded in.

If you only have a small number of scooters in a big city or town, they are likely to have higher utilisation for the fleet, but the impact on mobility in the area might not be that large yet.

There needs to be a sufficiently large fleet to satisfy demand, so Zag has also looked at the larger fleets.

Top five operations by estimated daily numbers of journeys in total:

1. Bristol (Voi)
2. Liverpool (Voi)
3. Nottingham (Wind)
4. Northampton (Voi)
5. Birmingham (Voi)

Zag’s estimates show the above have seen an average of over 700 journeys a day since their launch – making a real difference to urban mobility in the streets they serve.

All the above started as small fleets and have grown greatly since their launch so will each be providing thousands of journeys per day, now.

An honourable mention for Coventry (Voi) which lasted just five days in September before being cancelled due to misuse, it would have made this list too based on its spectacular usage numbers during its short life.

Voi has since restarted the Coventry scheme at a smaller scale, although this is in an area at Warwick University, around 3.5 miles away from Coventry city centre.

UK e-scooter utilisation March 2021

Zag has grouped the operations into a 3×3 matrix based on current fleet size and overall use (that is, our best estimates of the number of journeys per scooter per day since launch). On a smartphone browser, you may need to scroll the table to the right, to see the moderate/low use columns.

Following the receipt of new information and model updates, this article was updated after initial publication, to add Chester which was omitted, and to amend the category of the following fleets: Chelmsford, University of Warwick, Gloucester, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Colchester, Scunthorpe, Clacton.