Cost of Living
per year
per month
How Seattle's prices compare to the US city average across major spending categories.
How far does your salary go in Seattle?
Your $100,000 in Seattle has the same purchasing power as $80,463 in the average US city. You'd need $19,537 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 Seattle's cost index of 124, sorted by closest match.
Seattle has a handful of real selling points, and they're not the kind of thing you find in a brochure. Washington doesn't tax your paycheck and a high-income city, even by us standards are the headliners, plus 4 more things worth knowing. The rest is below.
Living in Seattle means no state income tax on your salary — Washington is one of nine states that simply doesn't have one. On a $100k income that's typically thousands of dollars a year that stay in your account instead of going to a state revenue department. (Washington taxes some long-term capital gains over a high threshold, but ordinary wages and salaries are not taxed.)
Seattle's typical household earns $116,068, which puts it in the top tier of US cities for household income. The bottom of the wage distribution isn't necessarily different from anywhere else, but the median and above sit meaningfully higher.
With a Walk Score of 98/100, Seattle 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 93/100 too, so even the trips that are too far to walk are usually doable on a bus or train.
Bike Score of 76/100 in Seattle. 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 Seattle comes in around 43, 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.
Seattle has a college-educated share of about 67% among adults 25+, which is higher than the national norm. It shows up in the local job mix, in the school district's reputation, and in the kind of conversations you have at the coffee shop.
Reasons are pulled from Seattle'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 38°F, Seattle 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 Seattle sit around 38°F — sweater-and-jacket weather most days, with the occasional cold front that reminds you it's still winter.
Warm without being brutal. Summer in Seattle sits about 75°F on average. Afternoons can push into the high 80s, but mornings and evenings are usually genuinely pleasant.
Seattle falls in roughly USDA Zone 9. The zone classification is based on average annual minimum temperatures, so it's the right lookup for whether perennials and trees will overwinter here. Note that this is approximate from our winter-temperature data — check the USDA map for the exact zone before betting an expensive plant on it.
Around 151 feet (46 m) above sea level — flat enough that nothing about Seattle's altitude shows up in daily life.
Seattle's reported crime rate runs high: about 6,626 per 100,000 residents, materially above the national average. Specific neighborhoods vary widely, but the city-wide aggregate is on the rougher end of the US distribution.
More expensive than average — by enough to plan around. Seattle's composite index is 124 versus 100 for the US, with rent and home prices driving most of the gap. Salaries in higher-paying industries usually move together, but the math still tightens for everyone else.
Yes, by US standards it's extraordinary. Seattle scores 98/100, one of the highest in the country. Transit Score is 93 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 $86,996 to live in Seattle 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 Seattle runs about $1,945/mo — keeping housing under 30% of gross income points to a similar floor on what you'd want to earn.