About Ideal City

Ideal City helps people figure out where in the United States they’d actually want to live. We score every place, county, and state on the things that shape daily life — cost of living, safety, weather, schools, taxes, commute, healthcare, amenities, and more — and put it all on one interactive map you can tune to your own priorities.

What makes it different

Every number comes from a public, authoritative dataset — never opinions or paid placements. Regions are ranked against their true peers (counties against counties, cities against cities), and each statistic carries its source. When you weight the factors that matter to you, the whole map re-scores instantly. See exactly how it works on our methodology page.

Where the data comes from

U.S. Census ACS (demographics, housing, income, commute, broadband), NOAA Climate Normals (weather), FBI & Jacob Kaplan datasets (crime), EPA (air quality, walkability), FEMA National Risk Index (disaster risk), NCES (schools), Tax Foundation & state agencies (taxes), FAA (airport access), USGS PAD-US (parks), and OpenStreetMap (amenities).

Who builds it

Ideal City is built and operated by Doubletrouble Apps. It’s free to use, needs no account, and is supported by advertising. Have a correction, a question, or a data source we should add? Get in touch.