Cost of Living
per year
per month
How Abilene's prices compare to the US city average across major spending categories.
How far does your salary go in Abilene?
Your $100,000 in Abilene has the same purchasing power as $116,822 in the average US city. You'd need $16,822 less here to maintain that standard of living.
Demographics and workforce data from the US Census ACS 5-Year.
bachelor's or higher
Climate, safety, and walkability indicators.
See a side-by-side breakdown of cost of living, housing, and salaries.
Popular comparisons
Sorted by affordability — most affordable first.
Within 10 points of Abilene's cost index of 86, sorted by closest match.
These are the reasons people actually move to Abilene, ordered roughly by what shows up loudest in the data. Living costs come in under the US baseline and wage income stays untaxed at the state level lead, plus 4 more things worth knowing — the rest unpacked below.
The composite cost-of-living index lands at 86, a comfortable 14% under the US norm. It shows up most clearly in housing, which is where the gap to coastal metros usually opens up. Median rent in town runs about $1,060/mo against a typical household income of $59,254, which is the kind of ratio that leaves room to save.
Wage income in Abilene isn't taxed at the state level. Texas is one of the few US states with no income tax, which is one of the reasons people relocating from high-tax states tend to land here in the first place.
At about 2.8% unemployment, Abilene's labor market is running on the tight side. Easier to land a role, easier to negotiate, easier to leave one job for a better one — the practical things that matter when you're actually looking.
Reported crime in Abilene comes in around 2,506 per 100,000 — under the national baseline of about 3,500. Worth digging into specific neighborhoods before settling on one, but the city-level picture is on the safer side.
With a citywide Walk Score of 57/100, Abilene sits firmly in the walkable-by-US-standards camp. Pick a central neighborhood and most daily errands happen without keys in your hand.
Average commute time in Abilene runs around 15 minutes one-way — short enough that it doesn't restructure your day. Compared to the 45-plus-minute commutes that are normal in major metros, the difference adds up to a real lifestyle gap.
Reasons are pulled from Abilene's actual data — Census ACS, BLS, BEA, NOAA, EPA AQS, FBI, and Walk Score. We don't list positives that aren't supported by the numbers, which is why different cities show different sections.
Not really a snow town. With winters averaging 37°F, Abilene sits in the mild-cold band where snowflakes appear occasionally and everything melts within a day. Most years see one storm worth talking about.
Cool, not cold. Winters in Abilene sit around 37°F — sweater-and-jacket weather most days, with the occasional cold front that reminds you it's still winter.
Properly hot. Abilene's summer averages around 94°F with daily highs that routinely break 100°F. The trick to summer here is starting the day at sunrise and staying inside through the worst of it.
Zone 9, give or take a half-zone. Abilene's typical winter low puts it in that band on the USDA Hardiness map, which is what nurseries label plants against. Use Zone 9 as your starting filter; the USDA's interactive map is more precise for borderline cases.
Around 1,722 feet (525 m) above sea level. Visitors from the coast occasionally notice a slight shift in how dry the air feels; that's about the extent of it.
Atlantic basin storms can form from June 1 to November 30, but the serious ones cluster in August, September, and the first half of October. Residents of Abilene learn the season's rhythm fast: watch the cone, board up when it's the call, and don't shrug off the slow-mover storms — those are usually the ones that flood.
Middle of the pack. Abilene comes in around 2,506 per 100,000, basically the national average. The interesting question is usually which neighborhood, not which city — that's where the real variation lives.
Abilene is a genuinely affordable city by US standards. The composite index sits at 86 versus the 100 national baseline — about 14% cheaper overall, with housing doing most of the heavy lifting.
In parts, yes. With a citywide Walk Score of 57/100, Abilene has genuinely walkable neighborhoods alongside more sprawled stretches. If walkability matters to you, the neighborhood choice will matter more than the city-level number.
As a rule of thumb, plan on about $59,920 to live in Abilene the way a $70,000 earner lives in a typical US city. The math gets less forgiving the lower you go below that. Median rent in Abilene runs about $1,060/mo — keeping housing under 30% of gross income points to a similar floor on what you'd want to earn.