West Sussex

West Sussex is a ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Surrey to the north, East Sussex to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Hampshire to the west. The largest settlement is Crawley, and the county town is the city of Chichester.

The county has a land area of 1,991 square kilometres (769 sq mi) and an estimated population of 892,336 in 2022. Along the south coast is a near-continuous urban area which includes the towns of Bognor Regis, Littlehampton, and Worthing; the last two are part of the Brighton and Hove built-up area, which extends into East Sussex. The interior of the county is generally rural, and contains the towns of Crawley and Horsham in the north-east and the city of Chichester in the south-west. For local government purposes West Sussex is a non-metropolitan county with seven districts. West Sussex and East Sussex were historically a single county, Sussex.

The South Downs are a defining feature of the county, crossing it from east to west and dividing the north and south. The downs are a chalk escarpment which falls away sharply into the Weald to the north and more gently toward the south, where there is a narrow strip of flat land between the hills and the coast. The coastal strip widens to the west, where it is punctuated by Chichester Harbour, a ria.

The county has a long history of human settlement dating back to the Lower Paleolithic era. During the Roman conquest of Britain, Romans conquered the Atrebates, West Sussex's indigenous Britons, and incorporated the area as a Roman province. During the Early Middle Ages, the Saxons settled the area, establishing the Kingdom of Sussex in 477, which lasted until c. 827 when the kingdom was annexed by Wessex. It is home to Gatwick Airport, the UK's the second-busiest airport by total passenger traffic. The county has a number of stately homes including Goodwood, Petworth House and Uppark, and castles such as Arundel Castle and Bramber Castle.