Best PlacesOrleans Parish, LA Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in Orleans Parish, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. Several measures below read low, and the ranked lists name which ones. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.
Orleans Parish ranks 2,765th of 3,144 U.S. counties on the BestNeighborhood index. It ranks low mainly on car insurance costs and noise. It does better on walkability, which keeps it off the bottom.
The best neighborhoods in Orleans Parish
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.
Orleans Parish's strengths and weaknesses
Orleans Parish ranks near the bottom because several of the basics fall short at once. Walkability is the standout, in the top 1% of counties. Cell coverage and biking follow.
The weak spots are broad rather than narrow: car insurance costs, noise, and state infrastructure all drag on the score. Those are area averages, and the map below shows which parts run well above them.
Where Orleans Parish ranks high
- WalkabilityBetter than 99% of counties
- Cell coverageBetter than 99% of counties
- BikingBetter than 97% of counties
- Educational attainmentBetter than 92% of counties
- Big-city accessBetter than 88% of counties
Where Orleans Parish ranks low
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than only 1% of counties
- QuietBetter than only 1% of counties
- State infrastructureBetter than only 1% of counties
- Crime safetyBetter than only 2% of counties
- Heat safetyBetter than only 3% of counties
What it costs to buy a home in Orleans Parish
A household needs to earn about $102,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Orleans Parish home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $69,236, 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 Orleans Parish's effective rate of 0.79%, 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 Orleans Parish
Orleans Parish's age mix sits close to the national median, 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 Orleans Parish.
Who works in Orleans Parish, and how
Work in Orleans Parish centers on health care & social and education. Unemployment sits above the national rate, and employment has held roughly flat.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 68%
- Work from home 14%
- Transit, walk, or bike 17%
Life in Orleans Parish
Orleans Parish has more restaurants and bars per resident than 80% of counties and more parkland per resident than 70% of counties. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Orleans Parish and thins out in others, which the map shows.
Is Orleans Parish growing, and who is moving in?
Orleans Parish has lost about 6% of its population over the last decade. The largest inbound stream comes from the rest of the New Orleans, LA metro.
Where new residents come from
Where people leaving Orleans Parish go
Move counts are the latest county-to-county migration flows, each county grouped into its metro.
What the weather is like in Orleans Parish, month by month
Orleans Parish sees roughly 124 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 92 degrees. January highs sit near 63, with lows near 48. The comfortable stretch runs October through April.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 63° | 55° | 48° |
| April | 79° | 71° | 65° |
| July | 92° | 85° | 80° |
| October | 82° | 75° | 69° |
Flying in and out of Orleans Parish
Louis Armstrong New Orleans International sits about 12 miles away. It is a medium hub and boarded 6.2 million passengers in 2025, with 112 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Orleans Parish
Schools across Orleans Parish average a C−, better than 32% of counties.
Top elementary schools
- Lake Forest Elementary Charter SchoolA+ · 77% proficient
- Edward Hynes Charter School - LakeviewA− · 57% proficient
- Belle Chasse Elementary SchoolB+ · 51% proficient
Top middle schools
- Andrew Jackson Middle SchoolC− · 30% proficient
- St. Tammany Junior High SchoolD+ · 26% proficient
- Einstein Charter Middle Sch At Sarah Towles ReedD− · 14% proficient
Top high schools
- Haynes Academy School For Advanced StudiesA+ · 93% proficient
- Benjamin Franklin High SchoolA+ · 92% proficient
- Thomas Jefferson High School For Advanced StudiesA+ · 80% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Orleans Parish school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Orleans Parish 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 Orleans Parish against the other 3,143 counties.
Who Orleans Parish suits
Remote workers
Internet is fast and widely advertised and 14% already work from home.
Common questions about living in Orleans Parish
Is Orleans Parish a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Orleans Parish ranks 2,765th of 3,144 counties. It scores highest on walkability, cell coverage, and biking, and lowest on car insurance costs and noise. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Orleans Parish expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $389,702. The overall cost of living runs about 5% above the national average. Set against a $69,236 median income, cost of living beats 19% of counties.
Is Orleans Parish safe?
Orleans Parish is safer than 2% of counties. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $1,049 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Orleans Parish?
July highs average about 92 degrees, and January highs near 63 with lows near 48. That works out to about 124 pleasant days a year, more than 77% of counties.
Is Orleans Parish good for families?
Schools beat 32% of counties, crime safety beats 2%, and childcare runs $702 a month.
Is Orleans Parish good for remote workers?
Cost of living against local pay beats 19% of counties, and the fastest advertised internet here beats 81% of counties. About 14% of workers already work from home.
Compare Orleans Parish with other counties
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Orleans Parish. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Orleans Parish 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.
Orleans Parish detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Orleans Parish: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Orleans Parish: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Orleans Parish: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Orleans Parish: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Orleans Parish 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.