These Are The 10 Happiest Cities In Ohio


We used science and data to determine which Ohio cities have big smiles on their faces.

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Do you live in one of the happiest places in Ohio?
According to a recent Harris poll, only a third of Americans say they are truly happy. That’s too bad, considering that Americans – especially folks in Ohio – don’t really have it too bad, in the grand scheme of things.
But, we were curious – which Ohio cities might be the most happiest? We’re about to find out, using science and data.
After analyzing the largest cities, we gleefully present the happiest places in Ohio:

  1. Beavercreek
  2. Westerville
  3. Springboro
  4. Upper Arlington
  5. Dublin
  6. Mason
  7. Gahanna
  8. Perrysburg
  9. Hilliard
  10. Hudson

Read on below to see how we crunched the numbers and how your town ranked. If you have a smile on your face, you probably live in one of these cities.
There’s also a chart towards the bottom that has the detailed stats on the top 20 happiest Ohio cities.
Oh, and by the way, East Cleveland is the most miserable city in Ohio. Sadly, Cleveland is 2nd.

How do you decide if a city in Ohio is happy or not?

In order to rank the happiest places in Ohio, we had to determine what criteria makes people happy. It isn’t a stretch to assume that happy people earn great salaries, are relatively stress free, have a stable home life and live where the weather is nice.
So we scraped the internet for those criteria, and it spit out the answer. Like magic.

How we crunched the numbers

We threw a lot of criteria at this one in order to get the best, most complete results possible. Using FBI crime data, the government census, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Sperling’s Best Places, and Twitter, this is the criteria we used, looking at the state’s 50 largest cities:

  • Percentage of residents with a college degree
  • Average commute times
  • Employment rates
  • Cost of living
  • Crime
  • Sunny days
  • % of married couples
  • % of home owners

For geo-located Tweets, we used #happy.
There’s a chart below the quick summary of the top 20 happiest cities in Ohio.

1. Beavercreek

The Greene Town Center Mall, Beavercreek, OH. Wikipedia

Population: 45,104
College degrees: 13th most
Unemployment rate: 10th lowest
It was close, but Beavercreek, a Dayton suburb, is apparently the happiest place in the state of Ohio. Let’s see why.
First off, it would be hard to find a smarter and happily employed number of people than those in Beavercreek. Only 4% of the people here are without jobs, and 76% have college degrees. We’re arguing that job security goes a long way towards happiness.
So does feeling safe. Crime is in the bottom 15% here (22nd lowest overall).
72% of the people in Beavercreek own their own homes, and 6 in 10 are happily married.
It doesn’t get much better than that, overall. The only knock? The cost of living here is really high. But they can afford it – families average about $75,000 a year in annual incomes.
Beavercreek has been on many ‘top’ lists before, including Money Magazine’s ‘Top 100 Places To Live in America.’

Other Highlights

Springboro: This affluent suburb smack dab between Cincinnati and Dayton has the highest population of married people in the state, at 69%. Springboro also ranks 5th in annual incomes, and 11th in the most sunny days in the state, each year. You get sunshine on your shoulders for 179 days a year here.
That’s a lot for Ohio.
Upper Arlington: This Columbus suburb has it made in so many ways. How can you not be happy when you earn huge sums of money? Families border on $100,000 a year each year, and hardly everyone has a job and a college degree.
It’s also the 2nd most expensive place to live in the state. We’re sure lots of people will argue that they’re perfectly fine with their small city lifestyle.
Cleveland is pretty miserable: Many of the 400,000 residents of Cleveland are most likely pretty sad. They rank dead last in employment (8.4% are out of work), and it’s the 3rd most dangerous place in Ohio. Plus, you see sunshine less than half the year.
The other C’s: Cincinnati ranks as the 15th most miserable and Columbus is about right in the middle. Dayton is even sadder than Cincinnati, according to the data.

There You Have It

Like we said earlier, trying to determine the happiest cities in Ohio is usually a subjective matter. But if you’re analyzing cities where people are not stable, where it’s dangerous and the weather is bad, this is an accurate list.
If you’re curious enough, here are the most miserable cities in OH, according to science: East Cleveland, Cleveland, Youngstown, Warren, Euclid.
Here’s a link to the complete data chart.

The 20 happiest cities in Ohio, with detailed information

ohiochart
We also wrote about the 10 Drunkest Cities In Ohio if you want another light-hearted study.

City Overall Rank Married rate Crime Rank Sunny Days
Beavercreek 1 60.77% 25.6 178
Westerville 2 58.46% 22.8 178
Springboro 3 69.05% 22.4 179
Upper Arlington 4 63.00% 25.5 174
Dublin 5 67.27% 18.6 176
Mason 6 61.33% 17 176
Gahanna 7 54.96% 24.7 177
Perrysburg 8 59.79% 27.9 178
Hilliard 9 61.19% 26.6 176
Hudson 10 68.64% 15.3 169
Kettering 11 51.22% 33.9 180
Grove City 12 56.44% 37.6 175
White Oak 13 55.80% 38.1 180
Centerville 14 56.47% 30.7 180
Maumee 15 57.11% 36.7 180
Pickerington 16 65.07% 29.8 173
Sylvania 17 56.92% 33.9 182
Bridgetown 18 53.96% 31.9 179
New Franklin 19 63.99% 15.3 165
Defiance 20 50.04% 35.2 182
Bay Village 21 62.86% 18 164
Strongsville 22 63.19% 17.7 166
Aurora 23 64.70% 23.2 164
Oregon 24 56.45% 36 177
Stow 25 55.63% 26.9 169
Green 26 59.52% 29.7 166
Solon 27 66.49% 22.6 165
North Olmsted 27 54.94% 27.1 166
Ashland 29 48.18% 26 177
Tallmadge 30 56.67% 45.4 168
Vandalia 31 55.90% 30.1 175
New Philadelphia 32 53.43% 18.3 167
Huber Heights 33 57.72% 71.4 176
Twinsburg 34 59.24% 18.3 163
Fairfield 35 52.43% 50.4 180
North Canton 36 49.69% 24.5 164
Marysville 37 50.28% 27.2 173
Findlay 38 48.98% 44.5 177
Mentor 39 59.02% 27.5 161
Delaware 40 52.27% 39.1 178
Streetsboro 41 52.85% 16.8 165
Sidney 42 50.01% 50.6 178
Avon Lake 43 63.00% 23.8 164
Piqua 44 51.97% 29.2 175
Lebanon 45 53.48% 32 175
Wadsworth 46 57.03% 22.8 164
Riverside 47 53.50% 44.3 179
Reynoldsburg 48 50.29% 48.8 175
Pataskala 49 56.63% 35.5 172
Miamisburg 50 56.34% 41.6 174
Westlake 51 57.24% 26.4 160
Forest Park 52 50.52% 42.2 178
Avon 53 63.88% 23.2 162
North Ridgeville 54 61.15% 29.3 160
Cuyahoga Falls 55 49.04% 36 167
Broadview Heights 55 57.79% 24 164
Fremont 57 45.48% 39.5 179
Bowling Green 58 27.74% 37.4 182
Wooster 59 45.61% 41.1 168
Tiffin 60 45.89% 50.4 179
Austintown 61 52.26% 25.7 161
Willowick 62 48.85% 29 162
Fairborn 63 43.05% 39.4 176
Troy 64 49.23% 84.3 177
Berea 64 45.23% 21.3 164
Shaker Heights 66 54.63% 36.4 160
Eastlake 67 49.96% 25.6 165
Middleburg Heights 68 52.38% 28.8 165
Rocky River 69 55.04% 29.8 161
Columbus 70 39.84% 67.5 178
South Euclid 71 43.19% 41.2 165
North Royalton 72 53.99% 26.8 160
Brunswick 73 56.48% 29.6 161
Fairview Park 74 49.80% 31.1 164
Medina 75 56.19% 39.8 166
Oxford 76 16.52% 53.2 181
Boardman 77 49.43% 39.9 158
Xenia 78 49.98% 39.4 174
Parma 79 49.87% 33.2 165
Cleveland Heights 80 41.15% 39.9 162
Willoughby 81 47.45% 27.8 161
Newark 82 49.95% 45.2 174
Springfield 83 41.23% 71 179
Norwood 84 38.28% 62.5 179
Massillon 85 45.86% 34.3 166
Toledo 86 38.30% 76.8 180
Mansfield 86 41.80% 52.1 175
Brook Park 88 52.07% 53.6 160
Mount Vernon 89 45.04% 58.5 173
Norwalk 90 53.58% 53.3 173
Middletown 91 47.07% 66.4 179
Athens 92 15.02% 30.4 170
Marion 93 42.13% 48 175
Lancaster 94 48.55% 49.2 174
Mayfield Heights 95 47.27% 33 160
Whitehall 96 37.86% 72.1 178
Niles 97 44.42% 46.9 160
Kent 98 28.47% 37.1 164
Barberton 99 43.87% 43.1 167
Chillicothe 100 47.50% 83 176
Alliance 101 40.21% 51 167
Trotwood 102 38.51% 55 176
Lakewood 103 37.29% 38.8 166
Parma Heights 104 48.32% 37 166
Lima 105 35.74% 76.8 179
Sandusky 106 42.64% 63.8 169
Garfield Heights 107 41.32% 57.1 165
Hamilton 108 46.18% 66.1 177
Cincinnati 109 31.97% 83.1 176
Steubenville 110 41.37% 56 164
Akron 111 38.80% 72.9 164
Dayton 112 30.38% 79.8 176
Maple Heights 113 39.98% 60.7 165
Elyria 114 47.22% 56 164
Canton 115 39.38% 73.7 169
Portsmouth 116 40.16% 63.4 166
Painesville 117 41.44% 42.1 164
Zanesville 118 39.33% 52.5 173
Lorain 119 44.32% 60.5 166
Ashtabula 120 47.27% 99.1 160
Euclid 121 36.79% 69.6 166
Warren 122 37.78% 64.7 160
Youngstown 123 32.38% 79 160
Cleveland 124 29.36% 89.5 166
East Cleveland 125 25.23% 90.8 160

About Nick Johnson

Nick Johnson earned his masters in Business Administration from the Drucker School At Claremont Graduate University. He has written for 39 publications across the country and ran the media relations department at Movoto, a real estate portal based in San Francisco. He has been featured in over 500 publications as an expert in real estate and as an authority on real estate trends. .

Nick's the creator of the HomeSnacks YouTube channel that now has over 260,000 subscribers and is an excellent source to learn about different parts of the country.

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