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A new report ranks the 10 best and worst U.S. cities for single people to meet someone

There are 35 elements at play.

dating, single life, bad dates, good dates, relationships

Do you live in a good dating city? A new report ranks the best and worst.

Photo credit: Canva, Katerina Holmes from Pexels (left, cropped) / Prostock-studio (right, cropped)
Ryan Reed
By Ryan ReedDec 04, 2025
Ryan Reed
Ryan Reed is a contributing writer for GOOD residing in Knoxville, Tennessee who specializes in stories on music and pop culture. He has contributed to Rolling Stone, Relix, Revolver, SPIN and The New York Times.
See Full Bio

What makes a city attractive to the unattached? You could make a massive list of qualities. And to help create their latest study, personal-finance company WalletHub did exactly that, using "35 key factors of dating-friendliness" to measure the best and worst U.S. cities for singles in 2025.

In order to focus their research, they evaluated 182 total cities, including the 150 most-populated. They did their analysis using 35 metrics that can be lumped into three broader categories: economics (everything from restaurant-meal costs to housing affordability), fun and recreation (things like parks per capita and presence of music festivals), and dating opportunities (including a share of the single population and "Google search traffic for the term 'Tinder'"). Each city was then given a total score out of 100, with the whole list ranked best to worst.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

What makes a city good and bad for dating?

Let’s start with the bad news. Brownsville, Texas: You came in at 182, ranking dead last in dating opportunities and 166th in fun and recreation. The bottom 10 is rounded out by:

  • Pearl City, Hawaii (No. 181)
  • Yonkers, New York (No. 180)
  • Hialeah, Florida (No. 179)
  • Port St. Lucie, Florida (No. 178)
  • Grand Prairie, Texas (No. 177)
  • Pembroke Pines, Florida (No. 176)
  • Glendale, California (No. 175)
  • Little Rock, Arkansas (No. 174)
  • Jackson, Mississippi (No. 173)

The top 10, perhaps unsurprisingly, features better-known cities with generally higher populations:

  • Portland, Oregon (No. 10)
  • St. Louis, Missouri (No. 9)
  • Orlando, Florida (No. 8 overall, No. 1 in fun and recreation)
  • Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (No. 7)
  • Austin, Texas (No. 6)
  • Denver, Colorado (No. 5)
  • Seattle, Washington (No. 4)
  • Tampa, Florida (No. 3)
  • Las Vegas, Nevada (No. 2)
  • Atlanta, Georgia (No. 1)

- YouTube www.youtube.com

It’s worth taking a closer look at what reportedly makes Atlanta ideal for singles. While the city ranked a below-average 128 in the economics category, it reached No. 3 for fun and recreation and No. 16 for overall dating opportunities. (Notably, it only beat out Las Vegas by .44 points—a dead heat.)

In their deep-dive breakdown, WalletHub highlighted Atlanta’s bountiful dating opportunities (including "an extremely high number of attractions, restaurants, and nightlife activities") and noted that "around 70% of the city’s population is single (never married, widowed, or divorced)." The sheer odds, it seems, are in your favor here. They also described it as the country’s "30th-most accessible city" in terms of transportation, with the population having a 16th-highest median annual household income (over $85,000).

"The best cities for singles have large, gender-balanced single populations, along with a wide variety of indoor and outdoor, daytime and nighttime activities," wrote analyst Chip Lupo. "They also have reasonable prices for dating activities or high average incomes to help ease the sting of inflation.”

- YouTube www.youtube.com

What do other studies show?

Another study praises Atlanta for its single-friendliness. Rental platform Zumper conducted similar research, placing the city at No. 4 overall—behind only Salt Lake City, Utah; Knoxville, Tennessee; and the top-ranked St. Louis, Missouri. Their top 10 also featured:

  • Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (No. 5)
  • Tallahassee, Florida (No. 6)
  • Minneapolis, Minnesota (No. 7)
  • Asheville, North Carolina (No. 8)
  • Richmond, Virginia (No. 9)
  • Austin, Texas (No. 10)

According to WalletHub’s data, there doesn't appear to be a direct correlation between "single-friendly" and "happy." In their 2025 list of the Happiest Cities in America, Atlanta came in at No. 74. Interestingly, only one city from the top 10 of the "singles" list (Seattle) cracked the top 50 of the "happiest" list (No. 13). Life is complicated.

And with all that data fresh in your mind, we’ll leave you with this: If you’re a single person in a fun city out on a first date, don’t be afraid to use a coupon. A 2025 Talker Research survey of 2,000 Americans found that 56% of people were totally cool with it, and 28% even considered that form of frugality to be, yes, "sexy."

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