Cost of Living
per year
per month
How Baltimore's prices compare to the US city average across major spending categories.
How far does your salary go in Baltimore?
Your $100,000 in Baltimore has the same purchasing power as $92,090 in the average US city. You'd need $7,910 more 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 Baltimore's cost index of 109, sorted by closest match.
So why do people move to Baltimore? The honest answer involves a few specific things the data backs up — most clearly you don't actually need a car and it's an easy city to live in on a bike, plus 1 more things worth knowing. The detail on each one is below.
With a Walk Score of 98/100, Baltimore is in the category where car ownership becomes a real choice rather than the default. Errands work on foot, the city's built dense enough that things are actually close together, and the parking-and-gas budget can quietly disappear. Transit Score comes in at 100/100 too, so even the trips that are too far to walk are usually doable on a bus or train.
Bike Score of 77/100 in Baltimore. That puts it in the small group of US cities where you can do groceries, commute, and run errands on a bike without it being a feat of urban survival.
Average AQI in Baltimore comes in around 36, well into the "good" band. Clean air isn't a thing you appreciate until you've lived somewhere it wasn't — and this is the side of that line you want to be on.
Reasons are pulled from Baltimore'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.
Yes, several times a winter. Baltimore's winter average of about 27°F sits right around freezing, so storms typically drop real snow that lingers a few days before slush sets in.
A real winter, but not a punishing one. Baltimore averages roughly 27°F in winter, with the coldest mornings dipping into the single digits a few times a year and most days landing somewhere between "chilly" and "actually cold".
Reliably warm. Baltimore's summer averages around 87°F, the kind of heat where you remember to leave the house before noon for outdoor things and accept that the back of your shirt will be wet by lunchtime.
Approximately USDA Hardiness Zone 8. That's the band gardeners use to pick plants — anything rated for Zone 8 or colder should survive a typical winter in Baltimore. (The estimate is derived from our winter-temperature data; the official USDA map uses station-level annual minimums and may differ by half a zone.)
Around 95 feet (29 m) above sea level — flat enough that nothing about Baltimore's altitude shows up in daily life.
Officially, Atlantic hurricane season runs June 1 through November 30, but most of the action lands between mid-August and mid-October. For Baltimore, that's when to keep half an eye on the National Hurricane Center forecast cone — and when an actual evacuation plan is worth having in the drawer if you're in a low-lying or coastal neighborhood.
Worse than the national norm, but it depends where. Baltimore's ~5,110 per 100,000 reflects a citywide aggregate. Some neighborhoods here are notably safer than the average; others are notably worse. Worth looking at the specific area, not the city-level number.
It's a middle-of-the-road US city on cost. Baltimore's index of 109 sits within a few points of the national average — your money buys roughly what it would in a typical American metro.
Yes, by US standards it's extraordinary. Baltimore scores 98/100, one of the highest in the country. Transit Score is 100 out of 100. Living here without a car isn't just possible; for many residents it's the default.
As a rule of thumb, plan on about $76,013 to live in Baltimore 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 Baltimore runs about $1,235/mo — keeping housing under 30% of gross income points to a similar floor on what you'd want to earn.