Columbia, Maryland has been named the 13th happiest city in the nation, according to WalletHub’s 2026 “Happiest Cities in America” rankings.
The city was in the survey’s top 10 happiest cities in America rankings in 2022, 2023, and 2024. In January 2026, Columbia was rated second in WalletHub’s “Best Cities for Jobs” report, and one year earlier was ranked third in the same report. In September 2025, Columbia was rated the best city in the nation for women for the second year in a row.
“Once again, Columbia has been recognized as one of the happiest cities in America,” Howard County Executive Calvin Ball said in a statement. “Envisioned by Jim Rouse to be a ‘garden for growing people’ and designed to bring people together, Columbia offers walkability, beautiful parks and open spaces, a vibrant arts and culture community, outstanding schools, and a strong local economy. Columbia is a thriving community where neighbors support one another and families grow together and where the spirit of inclusion, diversity, and community engagement continue to make it a welcoming place to live, work, and play.”
WalletHub, a personal finance outlet, compared 182 of the largest U.S. cities to determine which had the happiest people. They used 29 measures of happiness, broken into three categories: “Emotional and Physical Well-Being” (Columbia ranks 3rd), “Income and Employment” (Columbia ranks 162nd), and “Community and Environment” (Columbia ranks 101st).
“Emotional and Physical Well-Being” includes factors like life-satisfaction index, depression rates, adequate-sleep rate, and food insecurity. The “Income and Employment” category measures income growth, job satisfaction, 4+ Star job opportunities, commute time, and more. “Community and Environment” considers things like average daily leisure time, separation and divorce rate, hate-crimes, and amount of available parkland.
WalletHub asserts that money only impacts happiness up to a certain point of income. WalletHub cited $75,000 as that number, stating “cities where a lot of people make at least $75,000 per year are more likely to have maximized their happiness.” Their named “happiest city,” Fremont, California, has the highest share of households with an income above $75,000 (80%). People there also have the highest rate of life satisfaction, seventh-lowest rate of depression, and fifth-highest average life expectancy.
That $75,000 number, however, needs to be adjusted, according to Dr. Steven Meyers, a professor of psychology at Roosevelt University. He is one of WalletHub’s cited experts for the “Happiest Cities in America” study.
“A very influential study from 2010 found that happiness levels increase up until earnings reach $75,000, and then they level off,” Meyers said. “This amount needs to be adjusted into current dollars. More recent research has found that happiness continues to increase with even higher income. However, unhappy people often continue to find happiness elusive even with more money.”
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics‘ inflation calculator, $75,000 in 2010 would translate to around $112,616 in February 2026.
Regardless, WalletHub is not the only national survey that rates Columbia highly on the list of cities with people who thrive. In the past two years, Columbia has received a number of accolades, including a perfect score on the Human Rights Campaign’s Municipal Equality Index for the fifth year in a row. Niche, a national school search website, recognized Columbia as one of the “Best Cities to Raise a Family in America” in 2025, giving it an overall grade of A+.
