Is Sunderland in Newcastle? UK's perception of city revealed through nationwide survey

Everyone has their own feelings about their home city.
How do you think Sunderland is viewed by others in the country?How do you think Sunderland is viewed by others in the country?
How do you think Sunderland is viewed by others in the country?

But how do you think Sunderland fares in the eyes of the rest of the UK?

A nationwide survey, carried out by Premium Tours, set out to discover what people across the UK think about other cities, according to Google.

The map, according to Google searches.The map, according to Google searches.
The map, according to Google searches.
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Using Google autocomplete, the firm looked for the most-associated adjective for each UK city - and it doesn't make pleasant reading for Sunderland folk.

Sunderland, along with Carlisle, Manchester, and Portsmouth, was (unfairly, we think) labelled "a dump".

Other popular searches included: "Is Sunderland in Newcastle?" and "Is Sunderland a city?"

Read More
Read more: 11 things that make Sunderland special
The searches with Google autocomplete.The searches with Google autocomplete.
The searches with Google autocomplete.

But it wasn't all bad news.

Included in the top five searches, according to Google autocomplete, was: "Sunderland is a massive club."

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And while many Black Cats fans might not feel that way after last night's 3-0 home defeat to Aston Villa, it's good to know that some people out there on the internet remain hopeful about the remainder of the season!

And Sunderland certainly didn't come off as one of the worst.

The map, according to Google searches.The map, according to Google searches.
The map, according to Google searches.

That honour was handed to 2017's City of Culture Hull, which was marked up as "a portal to hell" and Swansea - Sunderland's rival in the 2021 Culture race - which was labelled: "the graveyard of ambition".

A spokesman for Premium Tours said: "The results we must say were surprising, and most certainly to be taken with a pinch of salt.

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"We can’t say we agree with many of the suggestions Google threw up for our beloved UK cities, and we’re sure you wouldn’t either, but they did give us a giggle at least."

The searches with Google autocomplete.The searches with Google autocomplete.
The searches with Google autocomplete.

Durham didn't get the best review in the Google searches either, with the most popular result as: "Durham is so boring".

THE RESULTS IN FULL

Birmingham - Booming

Bradford - Bouncing Back

Brighton - Overrated

Bristol - The Best Place to Live

Cambridge - Better than Oxford

Canterbury- The Greatest

Carlisle - A Dump

Chester - Cool

Coventry - Near Birmingham

Derby - A Footballing Town

Durham - So Boring

Exeter - Rough

Gloucester - A Dump

Hereford - A Dump

Hull - A Portal to Hell

Leeds - The Best Place to Live

Leicester - Pronounced Lester

Liverpool - The Best

City of London - Not London

Manchester - A Dump

Newcastle - The Best City

Norwich - The New Notting Hill

Nottingham - Full of Fun

Oxford - Better than Cambridge

Peterborough - A Good Place to Live

Plymouth - A Dump

Portsmouth - A Dump

Preston - A Dump

Salford - Not Manchester

Sheffield - The Greenest City in Europe

Southampton - A Dump

St Albans - A Dump

Stoke-on-Trent - A Dump

Sunderland - A Dump

Wakefield - A Dump

Westminster - The Central of London

Winchester - England's Ancient Capital

Wolverhampton - Not in the Black Country

Worcester - A Dump

York - Conquered by Viking Forces

Cardiff - Rough

Newport - A Dump

Swansea - The Graveyard of Ambition

Aberdeen - Depressing

Dundee - A Hole

Edinburgh - Awesome

Glasgow - Miles Better

Inverness - Wonderful

Belfast - A Dump

Data was gathered by using the search phrase ‘[city name] is’ in Google and noting the most relevant top autocomplete suggestion.

The firm did not include results that were the tagline from a political or commercial campaign, a company name, song lyrics or other such established phrases.

Data was not available for the following cities: Bath, Chichester, Ely, Lancaster, Lichfield, Lincoln, Ripon, Salisbury, Truro, Wells, Bangor, St Davids, Stirling, Armagh, Londonderry, Lisburn.