Cleanest Places to Live

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Many cities in the U.S. enjoy air that is considered clean for one or more of the pollution measures tracked in “State of the Air.” In this year’s report, 35 of the cities for which there is monitoring data had zero high ozone days and 22 cities had zero days with high levels of short-term particle pollution. This is a considerable worsening from last year’s report, when 55 cities had no days of high ozone and 75 had no spikes in particle pollution. Because year-round particle pollution is scored differently, the cleanest cities for this measure can be ranked, and the best 25 are considered cleanest.

In another grim indicator of the deterioration of air quality nationwide in this year’s report, only two cities - Bangor, Maine and San Juan-Bayamón, Puerto Rico - rank on all three cleanest cities lists. They both earned an A for both ozone and short-term particle pollution and are among the 25 cities with the lowest year-round particle levels.

The other four cities that made the Cleanest Places to Live list last year, Johnson City-Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA, Lincoln-Beatrice, NE, Urban Honolulu, HI and Wilmington NC, all had at least one bad particle pollution day that cost them an A and a return to the cleanest cities list.

Did You Know?

  1. Nearly half of the people in the U.S. live where the air they breathe earned an F in “State of the Air” 2025.
  2. More than 156 million people live in counties that received an F for either ozone or particle pollution in “State of the Air” 2025.
  3. More than 42 million people live in counties that got an F for all three air pollution measures in “State of the Air” 2025.
  4. Breathing ozone irritates the lungs, resulting in inflammation—as if your lungs had a bad sunburn.
  5. Breathing in particle pollution can increase the risk of lung cancer.
  6. Particle pollution can cause early death and heart attacks, strokes, and emergency room visits.
  7. Particles in air pollution can be smaller than 1/30th the diameter of a human hair. When you inhale them, they are small enough to get past the body's natural defenses.
  8. Ozone and particle pollution are both linked to increased risk of premature birth and lower birth weight in newborns.
  9. If you live or work near a busy highway, traffic pollution may put you at greater risk of health harm.
  10. People who work or exercise outside face increased risk from the effects of air pollution.
  11. Millions of people are especially vulnerable to the effects of air pollution, including children, older adults, and people with lung diseases such as asthma and COPD.
  12. People of color and people with lower incomes are disproportionately affected by air pollution that puts them at higher risk for illness.
  13. Air pollution is a serious health threat. It can trigger asthma attacks, harm lung development in children, and even be deadly.
  14. You can protect yourself by checking the air quality forecast in your community and avoiding exercising or working outdoors when unhealthy air is expected.
  15. Climate change enhances conditions for ozone pollution to form and makes it harder to clean up communities where ozone levels are high.
  16. Climate change increases the risk of wildfires whose smoke spreads dangerous particle pollution.
  17. Policymakers at every level of government must take steps to clean the air their constituents breathe.
  18. The nation has the Clean Air Act to thank for decades of improvements in air quality. This landmark law has successfully driven pollution reduction for over 50 years.
  19. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is critical for cleaning up air pollution. EPA’s staff ensure that air pollution is monitored, write sound rules to clean it up, and make sure those rules are enforced.
  20. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is under threat. Despite EPA’s lifesaving role in protecting people’s health from air pollution, big staffing and funding cuts are endangering their work.
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