Cost of Living
per year
per month
How Worcester's prices compare to the US city average across major spending categories.
How far does your salary go in Worcester?
Your $100,000 in Worcester has the same purchasing power as $91,316 in the average US city. You'd need $8,684 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 Worcester's cost index of 110, sorted by closest match.
Worcester has a handful of real selling points, and they're not the kind of thing you find in a brochure. Safer than the typical US city and genuinely walkable, not just walkable-on-paper are the headliners, plus 2 more things worth knowing. The rest is below.
Reported crime in Worcester comes in around 2,274 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 Walk Score of 93/100, Worcester 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 60/100 too, so even the trips that are too far to walk are usually doable on a bus or train.
Bike Score of 61/100 in Worcester. 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 commute time in Worcester runs around 24 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 Worcester'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 — and a lot of it. With winter averages near 20°F, Worcester sees real accumulation most years. Salt for the steps, tires that handle ice, and a sense of humor about February are the usual costs of admission.
Properly cold. Worcester's winter sits around 20°F on average — and that's the average, meaning plenty of nights drop well below zero. People here own gear.
Warm without being brutal. Summer in Worcester sits about 77°F on average. Afternoons can push into the high 80s, but mornings and evenings are usually genuinely pleasant.
Worcester falls in roughly USDA Zone 7. 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.
Roughly 502 feet (153 m). That's modest elevation — comparable to most inland-Midwest and Southern cities.
Hurricane season covers June through November, with peak activity in late summer and early fall. For Worcester, the practical advice is: have a few days of water and supplies on hand from August onward, know your evacuation route, and don't wait for the news to tell you a storm is "probably nothing" — track the cone yourself.
Middle of the pack. Worcester comes in around 2,274 per 100,000, basically the national average. The interesting question is usually which neighborhood, not which city — that's where the real variation lives.
It's a middle-of-the-road US city on cost. Worcester's index of 110 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. Worcester scores 93/100, one of the highest in the country. Transit Score is 60 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 $76,657 to live in Worcester 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 Worcester runs about $1,312/mo — keeping housing under 30% of gross income points to a similar floor on what you'd want to earn.