City comparison
El Paso, TX is about 650 miles (1,100 km) from Houston, TX in a straight line. By road, the drive is roughly 850 miles, or about 14 hours behind the wheel at highway speeds.
Driving distance is a rough estimate (great-circle × 1.25); driving time assumes a 60 mph blended average. Real trips run 10–20% longer with stops.
A direct flight from El Paso, TX to Houston, TX takes about 1 h 20 min, covering roughly 650 miles in a straight line. Connecting itineraries with a layover typically add 1–3 hours.
Block-to-block estimate at ~500 mph cruise, including taxi, climb, and descent — what an airline would publish, not pure airborne time.
El Paso, TX is on Mountain Time and Houston, TX is on Central Time — a 1-hour difference. When it's noon in El Paso, it's 1 p.m. in Houston, which puts El Paso 1 hours behind.
Standard-time offsets. Daylight saving applies in both cities for most of the year (exceptions: Hawaii and most of Arizona), and the gap between the two stays the same.
Houston has a population of 2,296,253, vs 677,181 in El Paso — about 3.4× larger by population. By land area, Houston covers about 640 sq mi vs 260 sq mi for El Paso.
Population from US Census ACS. Land area from the Census Gazetteer (city proper, excluding inland water).
Cost indices by category, with the US city average (100) marked.
Index: 100 = US city average. Lower is more affordable.
Side-by-side costs, salaries, and sub-category indices.
| Metric | El Paso | Houston | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median rent | $976/mo | $1,235/mo | 26.5% higher in Houston |
| Median home value | $159,300 | $235,000 | 47.5% higher in Houston |
| Median household income | $55,710 | $60,440 | 8.5% higher in Houston |
| Groceries index | 94.2 | 100.4 | 6.6% higher in Houston |
| Utilities index | 83.7 | 96.3 | 15.1% higher in Houston |
| Transportation index | 96.6 | 95.8 | 0.9% higher in El Paso |
| Healthcare index | 96.1 | 95.2 | 1.0% higher in El Paso |
How much you'd need to earn in the other city to keep the same standard of living.
If you earn $100,000 in El Paso, you'd need $118,298 in Houston to maintain your standard of living.
Climate, safety, and demographics side by side.
El Paso, TX is about 15.5% cheaper overall than Houston, TX, based on our cost-of-living index. Housing costs are roughly 45% higher in Houston than in El Paso. If you earn $80,000 in El Paso, you'd need about $94,638 in Houston to keep the same standard of living.