Best PlacesSummit County, UT Best Neighborhoods

2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026

Every neighborhood in Summit County, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. The averages hide a wide spread here, so the area matters as much as the address. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.

See the map of best neighborhoods

Summit County ranks 55th of 3,144 U.S. counties on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on population health by a wide margin, and an overheated housing market is the weak spot.

#55
of 3,144 counties
BestNeighborhood rank
Defaults weight crime safety, affordability, schools, and weather highest: the things hardest to change after a move
N/A
of 3,144 counties
Your rank
Set your priorities to see your rank

The best neighborhoods in Summit County

Map of the best neighborhoods in the Summit County area, with better matches in green and worse matches in red
Click the map to explore
National median
Worse match Better match
Colorblind friendly off
Popular priorities:

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 Summit County

The parts of Summit County, ranked by the BestNeighborhood standard score across every neighborhood, highest scoring first. Each note says how that part differs from the rest of the county.

#1

Summit Park & Silver Summit

Local pay stretches further, fewer homes sit empty, and incomes run higher.

WorseBetter
94th nationally
#2

Park City & Snyderville

It is quieter, though fewer households have young kids.

WorseBetter
88th nationally
#3

Kamas

Homes cost less, though fewer adults hold degrees.

WorseBetter
81st nationally
#4

Coalville

Biking is worse and fewer residents vote.

WorseBetter
60th nationally

Scores across Summit County run from about the 30th to the 98th percentile nationally. The map is where that becomes a choice of area.


Summit County's strengths and weaknesses

#55Best US county overall
Top 1%Population health
Top 1%High incomes
Top 3%An educated workforce
Each measure against the national median. Bars to the right beat the median; bars to the left fall short. Percentiles compare Summit County with other counties.

Where Summit County ranks high

  • Health outlookBetter than 99% of counties
  • Household income$144,869 median, better than 99% of counties
  • Educational attainmentBetter than 99% of counties
  • Heat safetyBetter than 99% of counties
  • Crime safetyBetter than 98% of counties

Where Summit County ranks low

  • Housing crash safetyBetter than only 1% of counties
  • Air qualityBetter than only 2% of counties
  • Low vacancyBetter than only 13% of counties
  • Disaster safetyBetter than only 22% of counties
  • Cheap childcare$929 a month, better than only 24% of counties

What it costs to buy a home in Summit County

A household needs to earn about $277,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Summit County home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $144,869, so buying stretches a typical household.

Income to buy the median home
$277,000
a year, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate
Estimated monthly payment
$6,463
principal, interest, tax, and insurance on a $1,133,554 home
Median rent
$2,421
a month, across all home sizes

Where the monthly payment goes

Principal & interest$5,780
Property tax$305
Homeowners insurance$378

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 Summit County's effective rate of 0.32%, 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.

Cumulative cost of renting versus owning the median home, first 10 years. Illustrative estimate.

Who lives in Summit County

Summit County's age mix sits close to the national median.

Median age
42
about the U.S. median of 41
Residents 65 and older
16%
versus 18% nationally
Average household
2.8
above the U.S. average of 2.6

Residents by age

Under 1822%
18 to 3419%
35 to 4920%
50 to 6422%
65 and older16%

Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for Summit County.


Who works in Summit County, and how

Work in Summit County centers on professional & technical and health care & social. Unemployment is low, and jobs are growing.

Work from home
25%
above the national average
Unemployment
3.4%
below the national average
Job growth
+6.0%
/y 2019-2023, faster than the national pace

Largest industries

Professional & technical12%
Health care & social10%
Education9%
Retail trade9%
Construction9%

How people get to work

  • Drive or carpool 70%
  • Work from home 25%
  • Transit, walk, or bike 6%

Life in Summit County

Summit County has more restaurants and bars per resident than 86% of counties and more parkland per resident than 91% of counties. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Summit County and thins out in others, which the map shows.

Places to eat and drink
467
restaurants, bars, and fast food, about 110.3 per 10,000 residents, more than 86% of counties
Coffee shops
69
about 16.3 per 10,000 residents, more than 88% of counties
Parkland
508 acres
about 12.0 acres per 1,000 residents, more than 91% of counties
Open past 10pm
~61
food and drink venues open late, about 14.4 per 10,000 residents, more than 93% of counties

Is Summit County growing, and who is moving in?

Summit County has grown about 10% over the last decade. The largest inbound stream comes from Salt Lake City, UT.

Population growth
+10%
over the decade, vs about 6% nationally
Population
43,109
up from 39,113
Population by year. Source: U.S. Census Population Estimates Program.

Where new residents come from

Salt Lake City, UT540 / yr
New York, NY302 / yr
Wasatch County, UT209 / yr
Provo, UT139 / yr
Portland, OR137 / yr

Where people leaving Summit County go

Wasatch County, UT869 / yr
Salt Lake City, UT813 / yr
Provo, UT146 / yr
Ogden, UT122 / yr
Teton County, ID115 / yr

Move counts are the latest county-to-county migration flows, each county grouped into its metro.


What the weather is like in Summit County, month by month

Summit County sees roughly 114 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 93 degrees. January highs sit near 36, with lows near 15. The comfortable stretch runs June through September.

Average daily high, mean, and low in degrees Fahrenheit, NOAA station data 2016 to 2025.
Show the monthly temperatures
MonthAvg highAvgAvg low
January36°24°15°
April61°44°29°
July93°71°50°
October64°44°30°

Flying in and out of Summit County

Salt Lake City International sits about 27 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 13.4 million passengers in 2025, with 154 nonstop destinations.

Nearest airport
SLC
Salt Lake City International, about 27 miles
Airport size
Large hub
23rd-busiest in the US, 154 nonstop destinations
Average drive
38 min
from the area, with no traffic

The best schools in and around Summit County

Schools across Summit County average a B+, better than 80% of counties.

Top elementary schools

Top middle schools

Top high schools

Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Summit County school and its grade on SchoolGrade.


Summit County 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 Summit County against the other 3,143 counties.


Who Summit County suits

Families

Schools beat 80% of counties and crime safety beats 98%.

See the families priority ↑

Remote workers

Cost of living against local pay beats 98% of counties and 25% already work from home.

See the remote-work priority ↑

Retirees

The weather beats 70% of counties and health care access beats 92%.

See the retirees priority ↑


Common questions about living in Summit County

Is Summit County a good place to live?

Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Summit County ranks 55th of 3,144 counties. It scores highest on population health, high incomes, and an educated workforce, and lowest on an overheated housing market and air quality. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.

Is Summit County expensive to live in?

The median home is worth $1,133,554. The overall cost of living runs about 21% above the national average. Set against a $144,869 median income, cost of living beats 98% of counties.

Is Summit County safe?

Yes, Summit County is safer than 98% of counties. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $233 per resident a year.

What is the weather like in Summit County?

July highs average about 93 degrees, and January highs near 36 with lows near 15. That works out to about 114 pleasant days a year, more than 70% of counties.

What are the best neighborhoods in Summit County?

Using the default rankings, the highest-scoring areas are Summit Park & Silver Summit, Park City & Snyderville, and Kamas. The ranked list and the re-weightable map above let you re-sort them for your own priorities.


Compare Summit County with other counties


Sources and methodology

Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Summit County. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Summit County 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.

Summit County detail on BestNeighborhood maps:

  1. Walk Grade for Summit County: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
  2. Noise in Summit County: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
  3. Conservative vs liberal map of Summit County: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
  4. Mobile and cell coverage in Summit County: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.

Summit County detail on related sites:

  1. CrimeGrade: neighborhood crime rates behind the crime safety score.
  2. ISPreports.org: provider by provider internet availability and advertised speeds.
  3. CoverageWatch: the car insurance premiums behind the cheap car insurance score.

Federal and public data:

  1. 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.
  2. U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program: population growth and net migration behind the population-change section.
  3. NOAA Global Surface Summary of the Day: the daily station record behind the monthly temperatures and the pleasant-day count.
  4. FAA Passenger Boarding Data: airport size and annual passenger counts.
  5. Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey: the 30-year fixed rate used in the cost-to-buy estimate.
  6. FBI Crime Data Explorer: reported offenses behind the tangible crime cost estimate.
  7. U.S. EPA Air Quality System: five year average air quality index.
  8. FEMA National Risk Index: expected annual loss from natural hazards.
  9. CDC PLACES: disease burden, preventable risk, and barriers to care.
  10. National Center for Education Statistics: school enrollment and assessment inputs behind the school grade.
  11. FCC National Broadband Map: internet and wireless availability.
  12. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: employment and job growth behind the local economy score.
  13. Religious activity uses a proprietary religious signal measurement.