Do you prefer Birmingham or Manchester

Manchester.
But Leeds is better,

Seen your update - Stratford upon Avon - beautiful.

What's your budget?
Move to Solihull or Sutton Coldfield.
Birmingham within reach without actually having to live there.

Liverpool 🤣🤣🤣

On that basis, Birmingham.

I am not from the area originally but live not far from it, or where you're looking at living. I have a friend on the outskirts of Manchester so visit there regularly too.

As city centres they aren't too different. But Birmingham feels like a happier place.

Might also be worth noting I am originally Northern. And would usually choose North over anywhere else. But not in this choice.

OP has said that their DC is home educated and ND, so it is likely that they will follow a slightly different timeline in meeting friends etc independently from the NT, primary/secondary school educated norm.

What is the HE community like in each area? While it is some years ahead yet, if eg standard qualifications such as GCSEs etc are in any way on the agenda at any point, some areas have more well-set-up HE groups / support than others.

LOL Stratford/Warwick/Leamington Spa is not Birmingham.

I would just bear in mind that whilst doing all of this stuff is lovely now, in 2-3 years, your DS will have his own social life and will probably want to spend more time with his friends from school at weekends rather than walking round museums with his parents (no offence) so I personally wouldn't choose to relocate to a completely new area purely based on what you do now.

We used to do loads of stuff with DSD at weekends but the second she started high school she just wasn't interested and just wants to be at the park / going into town / having sleepovers etc with her friends. Occasionally we can get her out with a bribe of a brunch somewhere 😂but it's really completely different to when they're at primary.

Second that re Stratford - not easy at all to get to Brum! I tried it onde for a day of work ahead of a weekend in Stratford (my work has multiple offices) and it was not quick at all! Albeit relatively straight forward as a single train, it takes ages - about an hour i think.

I think they’re very different, and both great places in different ways. I would probably live in Manchester over Birmingham simply because it’s easier to get to the cost and Birmingham seems so land locked.

Manchester would be further from my family though.

If you want Birmingham for all the reasons you've mentioned, then move to Birmingham!
Don't move to Warwick so you can enjoy trendy new cafes etc in a city (many of which are in suburbs, so if you wanted to do that you'd have to walk to the station (let's say 20-30 mins), train to the centre (40 mins), then bus to (eg) King's Heath, Moseley etc (20-30 mins). And the same in reverse. And the train ticket is probably £10.

Whatever you do, don't move to Stratford if ease of visiting Bham is a priority!

Warwick and Leamington are lovely places to live, and access to Bham is easy, but every weekend would soon grate.

Have you considered Solihull? More trains, only 10 mins, and probably buses too.

Wherever you end up, you're unlikely to be within a short walk of a station (area around Leam station is largely student, and the stock of nice houses is limited, Warwick isn't very big so you're unlikely to find something very close)

The advantage of Warwick/Leamington (and Bham) over Mcr is that it's closer to London (with the choice of 3 different train operators).

If you lived in Leamington Spa, for example, you'd still be able to go into London on the train for daytrips. You'd also have loads of other places nearby to explore. Find a place you like where London is easily accessible.

Probably Manchester in that case. Those towns you have mentioned are all nice and you can alternate your weekend trips between Liverpool and Manchester and you have the Peak District nearby too if you want a change of scenery. Plus you have Leeds an hour away.

Between the places you have chosen for Manchester, vibe is quite different. Knutsford and Alderley Edge to me are very much Cheshire: lovely walks, not tons going on but a few decent cafes and restaurants. Wilmslow also has nice walks you can do without getting in the car, Altrincham less so. But these 2 are a bit bigger, they are small towns rather than villagey, with slightly (slightly!) more going on and a less claustrophobic and pretentious vibe IMO, and if you're really city people, I'd pick one of these 2. Put another way: no one in Knutsford or Alderley Edge considers themselves to live in Manchester. People from Altrincham and Wilmslow often do

I was going to say Manchester until you said

And Knutsford, Altrincham, Wilmslow, Aderley Edge if we moved to Manchester.

Noooooo!!! Out of all the lovely places near Manchester, these are the absolute worst!

I much prefer Manchester.

Although I live close to the areas you mention living in if you chose Bham and would live there rather than the suburbs of Manchester. I find getting the train into Bham a depressing experience tbh. I don't like it as a city.

Stratford/Leamington/Warwick are places in their own right, and feel quite different from each other and very different from central Bham. I'm not sure living here will give you the London lifestyle you seem to still want. Lot's of young families are here partly because they don't want that London lifestyle of schlepping into central London to do anything.

I also agree with pp that it's hard to offer useful suggestions if you aren't willing to explain why you want to move? You seem to want a London lifestyle outside of London, and I'm not sure that's easy to replicate

I recommend Manchester over Birmingham.

I live close to some of the areas in Cheshire you’ve mentioned and it’s just 20 minutes on a train for me.

If you're thinking of not actually living in Birmingham, you can probably get to London by train in not much longer than it takes to get to Birmingham, along with places like Oxford depending on which train line you're on.

You would be best focussing on what is accessible from where you live rather than which the nearest big cities are. Both cities have very little compared to London but that's not so much the case if you consider where is accessible from there.

Also, what a 10 year old enjoys is likely to change pretty quickly once they start secondary school. While he likes visiting museums with his parents now, that might not be the case in 3 or 4 years

You still haven't explained the logic of why you are moving.

When I go to Birmingham I get scared I'll be mugged

I prefer Manchester. It's a smaller city than Birmingham and seems more vibrant. Birmingham seems to have all the misery of London with few of the benefits.

If your DS likes museums, thr Manchester museum of science and industry is great. We took dd there countless times and kept finding more of it!

Same is true for Manchester and every other city that isn’t London - and even in London you’d see everything you need to see in six months

Birmingham used to work in Manchester it’s dull and grey.

I lived in Birmingham for 6 years (quite a long time ago) , now Manchester is my nearest big city.

I'm not really a city type so if I had to live in one it'd be Manchester - Birmingham seemed a long way to get to good countryside and hills, Manchester is much better for that.

We go to the theatre a fair bit, it's pretty good for that IME, sometimes getting big productions before they go to London.