British Chinese

British Chinese

Distribution by local authority in the 2011 census.
Total population
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
Greater London, Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Newcastle, Sheffield
Languages
British English, Cantonese, Mandarin, Min, Hakka, Malay
Religion
Irreligion (majority), Christianity, Buddhism, Islam[4][5][6]
Related ethnic groups
Overseas Chinese, Britons in China, Chinese American, Chinese Canadian

British Chinese (simplified Chinese: 英籍华人; traditional Chinese: 英籍華人; 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.^[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 security laws imposed by China onto Hong Kong, the United Kingdom offered a pathway to residency to British National (Overseas) passport holders residing in Hong Kong - the majority of whom are ethnically Chinese.^[12] Two years since the introduction of the BN(O) immigration route in 2021, 144,500 Hong Kongers have arrived in the United Kingdom.^[13]

According to the 2021 Census, the Chinese ethnic group in England and Wales numbered 445,646, or 0.7% of the population.^[14] British Chinese live in every major British city, most notably including Greater London, Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Newcastle upon Tyne, Nottingham and Sheffield. 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]