City rankings

Most Walkable Cities

Everyday destinations close together: groceries, pharmacies, cafes, restaurants, parks and transit stops packed into the city core.

1. 1.Seattle, WA
2. 2.Los Angeles, CA
3. 3.Chicago, IL

Greenest Cities

Parks, gardens, nature reserves and playgrounds, both per resident and per square kilometer of the city core.

1. 1.Columbus, OH
2. 2.Charlotte, NC
3. 3.Denver, CO

Best Cities for Food Lovers

Restaurants, cafes and breweries per resident, plus how densely they cluster in the city core.

1. 1.Seattle, WA
2. 2.Charlotte, NC
3. 3.Austin, TX

Best Cities for Nightlife

Bars, pubs, clubs, breweries and theaters: how much there is to do after dark.

1. 1.Seattle, WA
2. 2.Austin, TX
3. 3.Columbus, OH

Best Cities for Arts & Culture

Museums, galleries, theaters, libraries and attractions per resident.

1. 1.Seattle, WA
2. 2.Nashville-Davidson, TN
3. 3.Austin, TX

Most Bike-Friendly Cities

Dedicated bike paths and cycleways mapped in the city core, per square kilometer and per resident.

1. 1.Indianapolis, IN
2. 2.Denver, CO
3. 3.Seattle, WA

Best Cities for Healthcare Access

Hospitals, clinics and pharmacies relative to the population they serve and the area they cover.

1. 1.Seattle, WA
2. 2.Charlotte, NC
3. 3.Columbus, OH

Most Family-Friendly Cities

Playgrounds, parks, schools and libraries per resident.

1. 1.Denver, CO
2. 2.Seattle, WA
3. 3.Philadelphia, PA

Best College Cities

Colleges and universities, with the libraries, cafes and bars that surround campus life.

1. 1.Seattle, WA
2. 2.Nashville-Davidson, TN
3. 3.Charlotte, NC

Safest Cities from Natural Disasters

FEMA National Risk Index scores for the city's county combined with how often FEMA has declared disasters there over the past ten years.

1. 1.Virginia Beach, VA
2. 2.Boston, MA
3. 3.Baltimore, MD

Healthiest Cities

Adult health outcomes and behaviors estimated by the CDC: obesity, physical inactivity, diabetes, smoking, mental distress, sleep and health insurance coverage.

1. 1.Scottsdale, AZ
2. 2.Seattle, WA
3. 3.Gilbert, AZ

Best Cities for Park Access

How many residents can walk to a park in ten minutes, and how much of the city is parkland, from the Trust for Public Land's ParkServe data.

1. 1.Irvine, CA
2. 2.St. Paul, MN
3. 3.San Francisco, CA

Cities with the Cleanest Air

EPA Air Quality Index summaries for the city's county: typical AQI, bad-air days and the share of days with good air. Only counties with air monitors are ranked.

1. 1.Port St. Lucie, FL
2. 2.Norfolk, VA
3. 3.Virginia Beach, VA

Best-Connected Cities

Households with a broadband internet subscription, and households with no internet at all, from the American Community Survey.

1. 1.Frisco, TX
2. 2.Gilbert, AZ
3. 3.Plano, TX

Best Cities for Car-Free Commuting

Workers who commute by transit, bike or on foot, and how long the average commute takes, from the American Community Survey.

1. 1.Madison, WI
2. 2.Minneapolis, MN
3. 3.Pittsburgh, PA

Lowest Student-Teacher Ratios

Public school students per full-time teacher across all the city's public schools. This measures staffing, not how well students learn, so it is not a school quality ranking.

1. 1.Buffalo, NY
2. 2.New York, NY
3. 3.Boston, MA

Most Affordable Cities

Rent and home prices measured against local incomes, from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey.

1. 1.Lincoln, NE
2. 2.Wichita, KS
3. 3.Fort Wayne, IN

Best Cities Overall

The average of a city's scores across every other ranking on USCity.review. Cities need scores in at least this many rankings to qualify.

1. 1.Seattle, WA
2. 2.Madison, WI
3. 3.Lincoln, NE