Best PlacesIthaca, NY Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in the Ithaca metro, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. This page is for people who live here or already know they want to. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.
Photo by Kenneth C. Zirkel, CC BY-SA 4.0, via wiki
Ithaca ranks 72nd of 387 U.S. metro areas on the BestNeighborhood index. It does not top any single list, but it lands above the national middle on an educated workforce and good schools. The weaker spots are property taxes, internet speeds, and childcare costs.
The best neighborhoods in the Ithaca metro
BestNeighborhood is the only ranking that scores 40 measures of daily life neighborhood by neighborhood and lets you re-weight every one of them yourself.
The best areas in Ithaca
The towns and districts of the Ithaca metro, ranked by the BestNeighborhood standard score across every neighborhood in each, highest scoring first. Each note says how that part differs from the rest of the metro.
Brooktondale
Tree cover is thicker, fewer homes sit empty, and it is quieter.
Downtown Ithaca
Streets are more walkable and biking is better.
Trumansburg
More households have young kids and crime runs lower.
Groton, Freeville & Dryden
Homes cost less, though fewer adults hold degrees.
Newfield
More residents vote, though transit reaches fewer jobs.
Scores across Ithaca run from about the 27th to the 96th percentile nationally. The map is where that becomes a choice of area.
Ithaca's strengths and weaknesses
Ithaca ranks where it does because the parts of life that are hardest to change mostly work here. An educated workforce is the standout, in the top 1% of metro areas. Good schools and population health follow.
The one real hole is property taxes, near the bottom of the country. Internet speeds and childcare costs also cost it ground. The measures below break that down, and the map shows how much of it holds street by street.
Where Ithaca ranks high
- Educational attainmentBetter than 99% of metro areas
- School gradeA−, better than 98% of metro areas
- Health outlookBetter than 98% of metro areas
- Heat safetyBetter than 98% of metro areas
- QuietBetter than 94% of metro areas
Where Ithaca ranks low
- Low property taxBetter than only 2% of metro areas
- Internet speedBetter than only 8% of metro areas
- Cheap childcare$1,317 a month, better than only 14% of metro areas
- State infrastructureBetter than only 15% of metro areas
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than only 16% of metro areas
What it costs to buy a home in Ithaca
A household needs to earn about $96,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Ithaca home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $82,790, so buying stretches a typical household.
Where the monthly payment goes
Assumes a 20% down payment, a 6.6% 30-year fixed rate, and a 28% share of income going to the payment. The rate is the 2026-07-23 30-year fixed average, series MORTGAGE30US from the St. Louis Fed, which publishes Freddie Mac's weekly survey. Against the median home value, property tax uses Ithaca's effective rate of 2.12%, and insurance is estimated at 0.4% of home value a year.
Renting versus buying
At today's prices and rents, renting stays cheaper than buying across the first 10 years here, so the case for buying rests on staying much longer or on prices rising faster than assumed. The chart tracks the running cost of each.
Who lives in Ithaca
Ithaca runs younger than the country, and households here run smaller than average.
Residents by age
Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for Ithaca.
Who works in Ithaca, and how
Work in Ithaca centers on education and health care & social. Unemployment is close to the national rate, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 57%
- Work from home 20%
- Transit, walk, or bike 23%
Life in Ithaca
Ithaca has less parkland per resident than most metro areas and more late-night spots per resident than 70% of metro areas. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Ithaca and thins out in others, which the map shows.
Is Ithaca growing, and who is moving in?
Ithaca has grown about 2% over the last decade. The largest inbound stream comes from New York, NY.
Where new residents come from
Where people leaving Ithaca go
Move counts are the latest county-to-county migration flows, each county grouped into its metro.
What the weather is like in Ithaca, month by month
Ithaca sees roughly 73 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 84 degrees. January highs sit near 35, with lows near 17. The comfortable stretch runs May through September.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 35° | 26° | 17° |
| April | 59° | 46° | 34° |
| July | 84° | 71° | 59° |
| October | 64° | 52° | 41° |
Flying in and out of Ithaca
The nearest airport, Ithaca Tompkins International, is about 4 miles away and is a small airport. The nearest major hub is Newark Liberty International, about 170 miles away.
The best schools in and around Ithaca
Schools across Ithaca average an A−, better than 98% of metro areas.
Top elementary schools
- Northeast SchoolA+ · 85% proficient
- Trumansburg Elementary SchoolA+ · 76% proficient
- South Hill SchoolA · 68% proficient
Top middle schools
- Russell I Doig Middle SchoolA− · 54% proficient
- Lansing Middle SchoolA− · 54% proficient
- Boynton Middle SchoolA− · 53% proficient
Top high schools
- Dryden High SchoolA+ · 98% proficient
- Lansing High SchoolA+ · 98% proficient
- Ithaca Senior High SchoolA+ · 95% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Ithaca school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Ithaca measure by measure
Cards are ordered by how much each measure matters to you, so the ones you weighted highest come first. Expand to see every measure. Percentages compare Ithaca against the other 386 metro areas.
Who Ithaca suits
Common questions about living in Ithaca
Is Ithaca a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Ithaca ranks 72nd of 387 metro areas. It scores highest on an educated workforce, good schools, and population health, and lowest on property taxes and internet speeds. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Ithaca expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $310,942. The overall cost of living runs about 2% below the national average. Set against a $82,790 median income, cost of living beats 37% of metro areas.
Is Ithaca safe?
Ithaca is safer than 50% of metro areas. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $353 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Ithaca?
July highs average about 84 degrees, and January highs near 35 with lows near 17. That works out to about 73 pleasant days a year, more than 27% of metro areas.
What are the best neighborhoods in Ithaca?
Using the default rankings, the highest-scoring areas are Brooktondale, Downtown Ithaca, and Trumansburg. The ranked list and the re-weightable map above let you re-sort them for your own priorities.
Is Ithaca good for families?
Schools beat 98% of metro areas, crime safety beats 50%, and childcare runs $1,317 a month.
Is Ithaca good for remote workers?
Cost of living against local pay beats 37% of metro areas, though advertised internet speeds beat only 8% of metro areas. About 20% of workers already work from home.
Compare Ithaca with other metro areas
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Ithaca. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Ithaca represents the same real quantity as a 60 anywhere else, and the ranking is a weighted average of those absolutes. The map colors come from a national scale calibrated against a population weighted random sample of 5,000 neighborhoods. That absolute scoring is what no other places-to-live ranking does: it puts a single neighborhood, a town, a metro, and a state on one scale, so the same 40 measures answer both which metro to move to and which street inside it to buy on. Read the full methodology.
Ithaca detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Ithaca: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Ithaca: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Ithaca: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Ithaca: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Ithaca detail on related sites:
- CrimeGrade: neighborhood crime rates behind the crime safety score.
- ISPreports.org: provider by provider internet availability and advertised speeds.
- CoverageWatch: the car insurance premiums behind the cheap car insurance score.
Federal and public data:
- U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey: income, home value, rent, vacancy, commute time and mode, educational attainment, home age, age structure, household type, industry, and race.
- U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program: population growth and net migration behind the population-change section.
- NOAA Global Surface Summary of the Day: the daily station record behind the monthly temperatures and the pleasant-day count.
- FAA Passenger Boarding Data: airport size and annual passenger counts.
- Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey: the 30-year fixed rate used in the cost-to-buy estimate.
- FBI Crime Data Explorer: reported offenses behind the tangible crime cost estimate.
- U.S. EPA Air Quality System: five year average air quality index.
- FEMA National Risk Index: expected annual loss from natural hazards.
- CDC PLACES: disease burden, preventable risk, and barriers to care.
- National Center for Education Statistics: school enrollment and assessment inputs behind the school grade.
- FCC National Broadband Map: internet and wireless availability.
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: employment and job growth behind the local economy score.
- Religious activity uses a proprietary religious signal measurement.
Your priorities
Move a slider to say how much a measure matters. Zero turns it off.