Background: there is increasing interest in how to age 'successfully' and in reaching consensus over its definition. Objective: to assess different models of successful ageing, using a British longitudinal survey of ageing in 2000-1. Setting: community, settings in Britain. Methods: five models of successful ageing were tested on a British cross-sectional population survey of 999 people aged 65+. The models were biomedical, broader biomedical, social, psychological and lay based. Results: the lay model emerged as the strongest. Respondents who were classified as successfully aged with this model, compared with those not successfully aged, had over five times the odds of rating their quality of life (QoL) as good rather than not good [odds ratio (OR) = 5.493, 95% confidence interval (95% CI) - 2.655-11.364]. Conclusion: the lay-based, more multidimensional, model of successful ageing predicted perceived QoL more powerfully than unidimensional models and should be used to evaluate the outcomes of health promotion in older populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]