City Intelligence
Worldwide

238,000+ cities. 246 countries. One platform.

UrbFact is a city data platform built entirely on official government data. Every number you see comes from a verified public source — the US Census Bureau, Bureau of Labor Statistics, FBI, NOAA, Department of Education, CMS, and Statistics Canada, among others. We don't use estimates, crowd-sourced data, or AI-generated content. If a government agency published it, we have it. If they didn't, we don't make it up.

US cities are covered in the most depth — up to 135 data points per city, organized across 13 tabs: demographics, economy and employment, housing and rent, health insurance, crime rates, 30-year climate averages, community and education, cost of living, top industries, colleges and universities, hospitals, and public schools. Canadian cities include Census data. International cities have population, coordinates, elevation, timezone, and country-level indicators like GDP and HDI.

Where does the data come from?

Every dataset on UrbFact is sourced directly from publicly available government databases:

US Census Bureau (American Community Survey 5-Year) — population, age, income, poverty, education, housing, commute, language, insurance, and dozens more demographic variables for 31,000+ US places.

Bureau of Labor Statistics (QCEW) — county-level employment by industry, number of establishments, average annual pay, and location quotients for 21 NAICS sectors.

FBI (Uniform Crime Reporting) — violent crime and property crime rates per 100,000 residents, broken down by type.

NOAA (Climate Normals 1991–2020) — monthly temperature highs and lows, precipitation, snowfall, humidity, and sunny days based on 30 years of weather station data.

IPEDS (Dept. of Education) — 6,000+ colleges and universities with enrollment, acceptance rates, tuition, and degree types.

NCES Common Core of Data — 89,000+ public schools with enrollment, student-teacher ratios, charter and magnet status.

CMS Hospital Compare — 5,400+ hospitals with quality ratings, emergency services, and ownership type.

Zillow & Redfin — home values (ZHVI), rental prices (ZORI), median sale prices, days on market, and inventory levels.

BEA (Regional Price Parities) — cost of living indices for 380+ metro areas, the only official government measure of regional price differences.

What tools are available?

City Pages — the core of the platform. Every city has a dedicated page with all available data organized into clean, readable tabs. For US cities, that means 13 tabs of real data. Scroll through demographics, check the local economy, look at schools, hospitals, crime, weather — all on one page, for free.

Compare — pick any two cities and see them side by side across every data point. Population, median income, home values, rent, crime rate, average temperature, commute time, education levels — all in a single table. The fastest way to evaluate two places when you're considering a move, a job offer, or an investment.

City Finder — filter cities by what matters to you. Set ranges for climate (average temperature, sunny days), economy (median income, unemployment), safety (crime rate), geography (population size, region) — and get a ranked list of cities that match.

Cost of Living Calculator — enter your current city, a target city, and your salary. The calculator shows the equivalent salary you'd need in the new city to maintain the same standard of living, based on official BEA regional price data.

Rankings — cities ranked across 23 different metrics in six categories. Sort by population, income, home value, crime rate, temperature, or any other metric.

Metro Areas — profiles for 416 metropolitan statistical areas with member cities, combined statistics, and cross-links.

Counties — 3,200+ US county pages with demographics, top industries, and all cities within each county.

ZIP Codes — individual pages for 33,000+ US ZIP codes with demographic data.

How often is the data updated?

Each source has its own release schedule, and we update as soon as new data is published. Census ACS data comes out annually, typically in December for the previous year. BLS employment data updates quarterly. Zillow and Redfin housing data refreshes monthly. FBI crime data is published annually with a one-year lag. NOAA climate normals are recalculated every 10 years (current period: 1991–2020). School, hospital, and college data follows academic year releases from the Department of Education and CMS.

Is UrbFact free?

Yes. Every page, every tool, every comparison, every ranking — completely free, no account required, no paywall, no usage limits. The data comes from public government sources and we believe it should stay public and accessible. UrbFact is supported by advertising.

Who is UrbFact for?

Anyone who needs to make a decision about a place. People researching where to move. Remote workers evaluating cities by cost of living and climate. Real estate investors comparing markets. Students choosing colleges. Journalists fact-checking local statistics. Urban planners benchmarking communities. HR teams calculating salary adjustments for relocating employees. If you need real numbers about a real place, this is where you start.