SNOWDONIA has been crowned the UK’s top national park.

To celebrate National Park Week, which ran from 15-22 April, Brecon Beacons Holiday Cottages compared several things including size, popularity, permissible footpaths for walking, biodiversity, highest mountains, castles, and dark skies to name the ultimate top 10, with Snowdonia National Park taking the top spot.

The Yorkshire Dales came second, followed by the Lake District, Brecon Beacons, Peak District, Cairngorms, South Downs, Loch Lomond and the Trossachs, Northumberland and then North York Moors.

According to data pulled from National Biodiversity Network Atlas, Snowdonia is also the most biodiverse national park with 14,580 distinct species and it also scored highly for walking, mountains and its Google review rating.

The largest of two National Parks in Yorkshire, the Yorkshire Dales became an International Dark Sky Reserve in 2020 and has the joint highest Google review rating with Snowdonia. It also scored highly for visitor numbers (9 million per year) and it’s size (2179 square kilometres).

The Lake District is by far the UK’s most visited national park attracting more than 16 million people each year. It’s also the best place to visit for top-notch food with more AA-rated restaurants than any other national park.

The Brecon Beacons are filled with mountains, waterfalls and underground caverns making it a perfect spot for an outdoor adventure. It’s also a top spot for historic buffs with nine different castles within the national park and a lack of light pollution means it has held dark sky status since 2013.

The dramatic limestone valleys and ruggedly remote moorland plateaus of the Peak District was one of the first special landscapes to be recognised by the UK government and it was named a national park in 1951. It’s the third most visited UK national park with 8.75 million annual visitors.