Bow is mostly young renters, and a large share of them rent from a council or housing association. About a quarter of households own their home. The typical resident is in their early thirties. Nearly half have a degree, and about one in six have no qualifications at all. Bow has two quite different populations living on the same streets.
At the 2021 Census, the source for every population figure here, Bow had about 71,550 people in about 27,700 households. About 25% of households owned their home. Around 41% rented from the council or a housing association and about 31% rented privately. Social renting is the biggest single tenure in Bow, ahead of both owning and private renting.
The typical Bow resident is about 31, and around 44% of people are between 25 and 44. That makes most of Bow's population adults of working age.
The Office for National Statistics models average household income across the area at about £67,700 a year before tax, for the financial year to March 2023. That figure is an average across neighbourhoods. In a district where well-paid renters and social tenants live in the same blocks, the average is almost nobody's actual income.
Bow is short on family homes and long on households of one. About 30% of households are one person living alone, and about 5% are a pensioner living alone, a group counted within that 30%. Couples with children make up about 17% of households and lone parents about 12%. Most of the rest are flatmates and couples without children.
The qualifications split two ways. About 49% of residents hold a degree and about 17% have no qualifications, while full-time students are only about 4%. Despite the university at Mile End on its doorstep, Bow isn't a student district. The graduates who live here have already finished studying.
At the 2021 Census about 84% of residents described their health as good or very good, and about 5% as bad or very bad. That fits a population this young. For Tower Hamlets as a whole, the rate of deaths that could have been prevented is similar to England's, and so is the share of adults who smoke, at about 14%.
On the measures that describe a neighbourhood's circumstances, Bow ranks below average. A degree-holding young workforce lives alongside a large population of social tenants, and the average income hides how far apart the two are.