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Background Women lacking social support during pregnancy often have worse mental health, but we know little about the potential influence of maternal social support on child health and development. Perinatal social support may be more important for migrant women due to their separation from previous networks of family and community support. We aimed to investigate the association between maternal social support during pregnancy and child health and development, and whether these differed by maternal country of birth.Methods Using data from Born in Bradford, a diverse birth cohort conducted in the Northwest of England, we evaluated social support using a composite score of items from the baseline pregnancy questionnaire. We used development assessments (Communication & Language; Personal, Social & Emotional) from the Early Years Foundation Stage Profile (EYFSP, age 4–5), and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) (age 7–11). Associations between social support and outcomes were assessed using logistic and linear regression models, adjusted for confounders. Additionally, we explored the modifying effect of mother’s country of birth (United Kingdom (UK) versus not-UK).Results We analysed data from 3,257 and 1,413 cohort participants who had EYFSP and SDQ outcomes, respectively. Higher levels of social support were associated with better EYFSP outcomes and SDQ scores. After adjustment for confounders, one standard deviation higher social support score was associated with 13% lower odds of not meeting any communication and language outcome (95% confidence interval: 0.79, 0.95) whilst odds were 17% lower for personal, social and emotional development (95% confidence interval: 0.75, 0.92). Additionally, one standard deviation higher social support score was associated with 0.65 (95% confidence interval: -0.98, -0.32) lower overall SDQ scores. Greater social support was associated with better outcomes in both UK- and non-UK-born mothers, however, there was stronger evidence of these associations in children with UK-born mothers.Conclusion Greater attention to the role of social support in pregnancy, and its social and cultural context, is warranted in the development and implementation of child health and development interventions.