We have designed and fabricated the single-layer high $T_{c}$ SQUID magnetometer consisting of a directly coupled grain boundary junction SQUID with an inductance of 100 pH and 16 nested parallel pickup coils with the outermost dimension of 8.8 mm ${ imes}$ 8.8 mm. The magnetometer was formed from a YBCO thin film deposited on an STO(100) bicrystal substrate with a misorientation angle of $30^{circ}$. The SQUID magnetometer was further improved by optimizing the multi-loop pickup coil design for use in unshielded environments. Typical characteristics of the dc SQUID magnetometer had a modulation voltage of 40 $mu extrm{V}$ and a white noise of $30fT/Hz^{1}$2/. The SQUID magnetometer exhibited a 1/f noise level at 10 Hz reduced by a factor of about 3 compared with that of the conventional solid type pickup coil magnetometers and a very stable flux locked loop operation in magnetically disturbed environments.s.