Living in Syracuse, NY

Syracuse's crime numbers hover right around the U.S. average. Violent crime index: 95. Property crime index: 79. The national baseline for both is 100, so you're looking at a city that's neither notably safe nor notably dangerous on paper. In practice, where you live within the city shifts the picture dramatically — a 10-minute drive can mean a completely different experience. Check local crime maps. Source: FBI UCR.

Most households manage fine. Median rent in Syracuse is $998/month, and the typical household pulls in $45,845/year — a 26.1% rent-to-income ratio. That's under the 30% threshold where housing costs start to pinch, though not by a huge margin. If you're a single earner or have significant debt payments, run your own numbers carefully. For dual-income households, the math works out comfortably. Census ACS 2023.

Most people in Syracuse are at work within 16 minutes — a pretty reasonable commute by American standards. The breakdown: 59.5% drive alone, 6.5% take public transit, and 10.5% work from home. Rush hour adds time, obviously, but the baseline is manageable.

The numbers suggest some caution. Syracuse's graduation rate is 70.0% with a 14:1 student-teacher ratio — both below where most parents would feel comfortable. That said, there are standout public schools, active magnet programs, and charter options that families swear by. If education is a priority, you'll want to target specific schools and be willing to live in their attendance zones. Don't write off the whole city based on averages.

Everything on this page is built from public government sources: rent and income figures from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS 5-Year Estimates, 2023); commute and transportation data from Census ACS tables B08303 and B08006; crime rates from the FBI Uniform Crime Report; school data from the National Center for Education Statistics. We refresh each dataset monthly through an automated pipeline and cross-check for anomalies. No surveys, no user-submitted guesses — just official federal data presented in a way that's actually useful for people researching a move.