54.5964° N, 5.9301° W
BELFAST
Most Famous People Born in Belfast, United Kingdom
- Notable people
- 1,393
- Peak decade
- 1950s
- Median birth year
- 1949
- Most distinctive
- Loyalist 272.1×
A divided city whose most distinctive profession in the entire dataset, at more than two hundred times the global rate, is loyalist — paired with republican at more than thirty, the statistical footprint of the Troubles. Belfast's other distinctive shelves are boxers, rugby players (grouped as 'player'), footballers, and cricketers at concentrations that outpace every other city on the island. Van Morrison, George Best, Kenneth Branagh, and C.S. Lewis all grew up within walking distance of the Lagan, and the 19th-century shipbuilding establishment that built the Titanic anchors the older half of the bench.
One face per decade — the most globally famous figure born in Belfast during each.
Notable Births by Decade
Click a decade to filter the list below. Peak: 1950s with 179 notable births.
What Belfast Is Known For
Click any row to filter the list of people below.
Football is Belfast's biggest profession — 23% of all notables (321).
Belfast over-indexes on loyalist — 272.1× the global rate.
Belfast under-produces painter — only 0.5× the global rate.
Profession Mix Over Time
Each band shows a profession family's share of Belfast's notable births by decade. Hover the chart for the breakdown at any decade.
- Sports
- Politics & Law
- Film & TV
- Writing
- Science
- Music
- Other
- Filtered to 1840s Clear ×
Osborne Reynolds
1842 - 1912
W. Godfrey Hunter
1841 - 1917
Hiram Shaw Wilkinson
1840 - 1926
Rosa Mulholland
1841 - 1921
Thomas Hamilton (university administrator)
1842 - 1926
Thomas Workman (entomologist)
1844 - 1900
William Thomas Braithwaite
1844 - 1918
Michael Banks
1846 - 1905
James Henderson (Irish politician)
1846 - 1924
Florence Wallace Pomeroy, Viscountess Harberton
1843 - 1911
Harman Tarrant
1844 - 1900