// CITY_ASSESSMENT
How smart is Birmingham?
Birmingham, United Kingdom, scores 88.9% against the DC20 smart city framework in 2026 — ranked #5 of 213 cities assessed, with every finding traceable to a public source.
Smart score
88.9%
Rank
#5 / 213
Criteria present
70 / 82
Evidence coverage
91.5%
Birmingham's smart city score by area
14 present · 2 partial · 3 absent · 2 not assessed
16 present · 0 partial · 0 absent
17 present · 0 partial · 0 absent
17 present · 3 partial · 0 absent
6 present · 0 partial · 2 absent
Where Birmingham is strong
- ▸Pervasive IoT Sensing
- ▸Integrated Multimodal Mobility (MaaS)
- ▸Real-time Public Transit Intelligence
- ▸Smart Traffic & Adaptive Signals
- ▸EV & Active-Travel Infrastructure
Where the gaps are
- ▸Digital Twin
- ▸Outcome Measurement & KPIs
- ▸City Data Platform / Urban Data Exchange
Evidence highlights
Open Data by Default · Official open data portal
The official Birmingham City Council website features a section specifically for 'Transparency and Open Data'.
https://www.birmingham.gov.uk/info/20094/transparency_and_open_data/1630/open_dataOpen Data by Default · Open APIs / programmatic access
The Birmingham City Observatory provides an API catalogue, and Transport for West Midlands (TFWM), which covers Birmingham, offers programmatic access to its data via an API.
https://birminghamcityobservatory.com/pages/api-catalogueOpen Data by Default · Open licensing & terms
At least one major utility provider serving Birmingham, Severn Trent, explicitly uses a clear open license (CC-BY 4.0) for its open data.
https://www.severntrent.com/content/dam/stw/regulatory_library/2023/Regulatory-Reporting-Open-Data-CC-BY-4.0-Licence-Terms.pdfCity Data Platform / Urban Data Exchange · Central data platform / urban OS
The Birmingham City Observatory is on a journey to establish a 'single source of truth' for data, indicating an effort to integrate data across city agencies for data-driven decision-making.
https://www.lga.org.uk/case-studies/data-driven-decision-making-birmingham-city-observatorys-journey-single-source-truthAbout this assessment
Birmingham was assessed against the 82 criteria of the DC20 smart city framework on 2026-07-01 by AI agents gathering evidence from official public sources. Each criterion is marked present, partial or absent, and every finding links to where it was found — see how smart cities are measured. Scores refresh continuously as cities publish new evidence.