Best PlacesMankato, MN Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in the Mankato 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 Bethany Lutheran College, CC BY-SA 4.0, via commons
Mankato ranks 34th 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 short commutes and low crime. The weaker spots are transit, taxes, and internet speeds.
The best neighborhoods in the Mankato 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 Mankato
The towns and districts of the Mankato 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.
Eagle Lake
More households have young kids, fewer homes sit empty, and local pay stretches further.
Mapleton
It is quieter, though biking is worse.
St. Peter
Advertised internet is faster, though schools score lower.
Lake Crystal
Homes cost less, though commutes are longer.
Downtown Mankato
Streets are more walkable, though incomes run lower.
Scores across Mankato run from about the 32nd to the 94th percentile nationally. The map is where that becomes a choice of area.
Mankato's strengths and weaknesses
Mankato ranks where it does because the parts of life that are hardest to change mostly work here. Short commutes is the standout, in the top 2% of metro areas. Low crime and state infrastructure follow.
The drawbacks are real but narrow. Transit, taxes, and internet speeds hold the score down. The measures below break that down, and the map shows how much of it holds street by street.
Where Mankato ranks high
- Short commute16.7 minutes each way, better than 98% of metro areas
- Crime safetyBetter than 92% of metro areas
- State infrastructureBetter than 90% of metro areas
- Heat safetyBetter than 88% of metro areas
- Health outlookBetter than 83% of metro areas
Where Mankato ranks low
- TransitBetter than only 13% of metro areas
- Low income/sales/gas taxBetter than only 19% of metro areas
- Internet speedBetter than only 29% of metro areas
- Tree shadeBetter than only 30% of metro areas
- Local economyBetter than only 32% of metro areas
What it costs to buy a home in Mankato
A household needs to earn about $74,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Mankato home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That is below the area's own median income of $81,483, so a typical household can afford the median home outright.
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 Mankato's effective rate of 0.99%, and insurance is estimated at 0.4% of home value a year.
Renting versus buying
At today's prices, buying tends to cost more than renting for about the first 9 years, then pulls ahead as rent keeps rising and the mortgage builds equity. The chart tracks the running cost of each.
Who lives in Mankato
Mankato 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 Mankato.
Who works in Mankato, and how
Work in Mankato centers on health care & social and manufacturing. Unemployment is close to the national rate, and employment has held roughly flat.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 83%
- Work from home 10%
- Transit, walk, or bike 7%
Life in Mankato
Mankato has fewer places to eat and drink per resident than most metro areas and more parkland per resident than 92% of metro areas. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Mankato and thins out in others, which the map shows.
Is Mankato growing, and who is moving in?
Mankato has grown about 7% over the last decade. The largest inbound stream comes from Minneapolis, MN.
Where new residents come from
Where people leaving Mankato go
Move counts are the latest county-to-county migration flows, each county grouped into its metro.
What the weather is like in Mankato, month by month
Mankato sees roughly 120 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 83 degrees. January highs sit near 26, with lows near 11. The comfortable stretch runs May through September.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 26° | 18° | 11° |
| April | 57° | 45° | 37° |
| July | 83° | 73° | 64° |
| October | 60° | 49° | 41° |
Flying in and out of Mankato
Minneapolis-St Paul International/Wold-Chamberlain sits about 63 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 17.5 million passengers in 2025, with 195 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Mankato
Schools across Mankato average a B+, better than 83% of metro areas.
Top elementary schools
- Lk Crystal Wellcome Memorial ElA · 70% proficient
- Bridges Community ElementaryA · 68% proficient
- Nicollet Elementary SchoolA− · 60% proficient
Top middle schools
- Dakota Meadows Middle SchoolB · 45% proficient
- Prairie Winds Middle SchoolB− · 40% proficient
Top high schools
- Mankato West Senior HighA− · 65% proficient
- Maple River SecondaryA− · 59% proficient
- Mankato East Senior HighB+ · 57% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Mankato school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Mankato 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 Mankato against the other 386 metro areas.
Who Mankato suits
Retirees
The weather beats 74% of metro areas and health care access beats 70%.
Common questions about living in Mankato
Is Mankato a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Mankato ranks 34th of 387 metro areas. It scores highest on short commutes, low crime, and state infrastructure, and lowest on transit and taxes. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Mankato expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $277,226. The overall cost of living runs about 13% below the national average. Set against a $81,483 median income, cost of living beats 66% of metro areas.
Is Mankato safe?
Yes, Mankato is safer than 92% of metro areas. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $241 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Mankato?
July highs average about 83 degrees, and January highs near 26 with lows near 11. That works out to about 120 pleasant days a year, more than 74% of metro areas.
What are the best neighborhoods in Mankato?
Using the default rankings, the highest-scoring areas are Eagle Lake, Mapleton, and St. Peter. The ranked list and the re-weightable map above let you re-sort them for your own priorities.
Is Mankato good for families?
Schools beat 83% of metro areas, crime safety beats 92%, and childcare runs $961 a month.
Is Mankato good for remote workers?
Cost of living against local pay beats 66% of metro areas, though advertised internet speeds beat only 29% of metro areas. About 10% of workers already work from home.
Compare Mankato with other metro areas
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Mankato. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Mankato 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.
Mankato detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Mankato: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Mankato: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Mankato: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Mankato: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Mankato 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.