Cost of Living Calculator

This calculator answers the question behind every move: what would I need to earn there to live the way I live here? It compares price levels between any two of 387 U.S. metropolitan areas and all fifty states plus D.C., and converts your salary at the ratio between them.

Where the numbers come from

The price levels are the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis's Regional Price Parities for 2024, the most recent year published. An RPP measures how expensive a place is against the national average of 100, across the whole basket people spend on: goods, rents, utilities and other services. A metro with an RPP of 115 is 15% more expensive than the country as a whole; one at 90 is 10% cheaper. These are federal statistics built from the Consumer Price Index and the American Community Survey, which makes them the most defensible cost-of-living comparison available — commercial "cost of living index" sites use their own surveys and different baskets, so their figures won't match each other or this one.

How to use it

Enter your salary — or any amount you want to translate, like a monthly budget or a rent — and pick where you live now and where you're comparing. The equivalent salary is what you'd need there to keep the same standard of living. The breakdown shows which categories drive the difference, and the table at the bottom translates your salary into eighteen of the country's largest metro areas at once.

Reading the results

• Housing is usually the story. Goods cost roughly the same everywhere because they're shipped nationally; rents vary by a factor of three. If the headline gap is 15% but rents differ by 60%, a renter will feel the larger number.
• Metros and states are different things. A state's RPP averages its cities with its countryside. Comparing San Francisco with all of Texas will overstate the gap with Austin or Dallas — pick the metro you're actually moving to.
• Taxes are not in it. RPPs measure prices, not taxes. Moving from a state with no income tax to one with a high rate changes take-home pay on top of this; run both salaries through a paycheck calculator to see it.

Caveats

The indexes describe 2024 prices, published by BEA early in 2026; relative price levels change slowly, so they remain a good guide, but rents in fast-growing metros may have moved since. They describe a typical household's spending, not yours — someone who owns outright, or who spends most of their money online, will see less difference than the index. And they compare price levels, not quality of life, wages or job markets.