City safety & data profile
New BedfordMA
New Bedford, MA is a 101K-resident city in Bristol County with a median household income of $56,981.
Bristol County, Massachusetts. Federal health, economic, and safety indicators for New Bedford, drawn from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey, CDC PLACES, and CMS Hospital Compare. New Bedford has a population larger than 93% of the 4,640 U.S. cities Areazine tracks, and a median home value of $357,300.
Data updated 2026-09-04
- 101K
- Population (place)
- Top 7%
- By size
- $56,981
- Median income (place)
- $357,300
- Median home (place)
- 20.6%
- Poverty rate (place)
The read on New Bedford
New Bedford posts a median household income higher than 18% of U.S. cities Areazine tracks.
- Bottom 19%
- by median income, US cities
Where New Bedford income ranks nationally
Median household income vs. every place Areazine profiles (place-level ACS)
$56,981 Bottom 18% higher than 18% of 3,889 places Areazine profiles
Each bar is a $20K-wide band; taller bars hold more places Areazine profiles. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey (place-level) · 2024 ACS 5-year
Largest cities in MA
Population among 78 MA places with 10,000+ residents and ACS income on Areazine. Tooltip shows the income rank in the same pool.
- Boston
Boston, MA
653,833 residents
- Worcester 206,518
Worcester, MA
206,518 residents
- Springfield 154,341
Springfield, MA
154,341 residents
- Lowell 110,699
Lowell, MA
110,699 residents
- Cambridge 110,402
Cambridge, MA
110,402 residents
- New Bedford 101,079
New Bedford, MA
101,079 residents
- Brockton 95,314
Brockton, MA
95,314 residents
- Fall River 94,000
Fall River, MA
94,000 residents
- Quincy 93,618
Quincy, MA
93,618 residents
- Lynn 92,457
Lynn, MA
92,457 residents
What this shows Boston is the largest MA city on this list; Wellesley leads median income.
Highest median incomes in MA
Median household income among the same 78-city pool. Tooltip shows the population rank.
- Wellesley
Wellesley, MA
$250,001 median
- Lexington
Lexington, MA
$238,444 median
- Winchester
Winchester, MA
$230,198 median
- Needham
Needham, MA
$214,308 median
- Newton
Newton, MA
$190,304 median
- Milton
Milton, MA
$188,529 median
- Belmont
Belmont, MA
$183,137 median
- Marblehead
Marblehead, MA
$182,132 median
- Lynnfield
Lynnfield, MA
$175,265 median
- Wilmington
Wilmington, MA
$168,152 median
What this shows Wellesley posts the highest place-level median income in MA; Boston is largest by headcount.
The quick read
Reading New Bedford, MA beyond the headline numbers
New Bedford sits inside Bristol County, Massachusetts, at roughly 41.64°N, -70.93°W. Population 101,079, $56,981 median household income. Median home value $357,300, median rent $1,137. Poverty rate 20.6%, read against that income figure since two cities on the same median can differ underneath it.
20.6% of New Bedford, MA residents live below the poverty line, placing it in the hardest-hit quarter of reporting cities. Read every median on this page against that: half the households are above it, and a large minority are far below.
The median home in New Bedford costs around 6.3 times what a median household earns in a year -- the most expensive quarter of reporting cities, and far enough ahead of local pay that ownership is largely closed to median earners.
Only 5.4% of New Bedford workers report working from home, the lowest quarter of reporting cities -- an economy still built around showing up somewhere.
Among the CDC measures on this page, current asthma departs furthest from its peer median: 13.8% in New Bedford, the highest-prevalence quarter of the 3,722 cities reporting that measure.
2.7% of New Bedford workers commute by public transit, a larger share than at least three quarters of reporting cities.
Sources: U.S. Census ACS, CDC PLACES, CMS Hospital Compare, plus live alerts for New Bedford from FEMA, NOAA, FDA, and CPSC. Economic comparison bars use the unweighted average across tracked Census places with a reported value, not a household-weighted national median.
10-Year Trends 2013–2024
County-level trend (Bristol County): New Bedford's own historical series isn't separately published by the Census Bureau, so these year-over-year figures track the surrounding county, not the city alone.
Economics
| Indicator | Value |
|---|---|
| Median Rent | |
| Poverty Rate | 20.6% +66% vs avg |
| Unemployment | 8.3% |
| Bachelor's Degree+ | 17% |
| Work From Home | 5.4% |
| Public Transit | 2.7% |
Population
Health Profile 15 measures
Health Indicators
Preventive Care
Other Measures
What alerts and safety updates affect New Bedford?
No area-tagged alerts are on record for New Bedford right now. New federal and counterpart-agency notices still land in the site feed as agencies publish them.
City alert dispatch desk
Sheet MA-NEW-BEDFORD · New Bedford
New Bedford: no area-tagged alerts on record — state hubs carry the live CAP stream.
- FEED-QUIET No tagged alerts
- LEAD-NONE Feed idle
- DESK-IDLE Awaiting feed
Counts reflect published articles tagged to New Bedford; untagged NOAA county warnings may still appear in the site feed. Browse Massachusetts state hubs · Methodology
Read with this city profile
Frequently Asked Questions 5
What is the population of New Bedford, MA? ▼
What is the median household income in New Bedford? ▼
What is the median home value in New Bedford? ▼
What are the top health concerns in New Bedford? ▼
What is the median age in New Bedford? ▼
Nationwide cities with similar poverty or income 8
Two ACS-derived peer sets for New Bedford, both outside Massachusetts so the neighborhoods are not the geographic nearby list below.
Similar poverty rate
Nearest place-level ACS poverty rates outside MA (20.6% here).
Similar median income
Nearest place-level ACS median household incomes outside MA ($56,981 here).
Compare New Bedford with another city
Pick a second U.S. city to open a side-by-side profile on population, income, health, and hospitals, the same federal datasets as this page.
Nearby Cities 8
Using New Bedford's profile
Use this as a starting research checklist, not a verdict on whether to live here.
- Check live recalls, weather and hazard alerts scoped to the New Bedford area before relying on national headlines. Check your area
- Read the poverty rate alongside the income figure, two places with the same median can have very different realities.
- Compare New Bedford against Massachusetts peers on any ranking lens. Explore Massachusetts
Population and economics (income, home value, poverty, education) are place-level U.S. Census ACS; health is CDC PLACES; hospital counts reflect facilities in and around the city. County-level trends are labeled when shown.
Data Sources
All data on this page comes from official U.S. government sources. Population and economic data from the Census Bureau American Community Survey (2024 5-year estimates, place geography). Health data from the CDC PLACES program (2023). Hospital ratings from CMS Hospital Compare (2024). Climate data from NOAA. Education data from NCES. Cost of living from Bureau of Economic Analysis. Crime statistics, where referenced on Areazine, originate from the FBI Crime Data Explorer. Housing market figures referenced on Areazine come from HUD Fair Market Rents. Census economics and population are at place geography; some health and hospital indicators are reported at the county level (Bristol County) where that is the smallest published unit.
Every figure on Areazine is published directly from official U.S. government sources, no number is typed in by an editor. City demographic and health figures are compiled directly from U.S. Census (place-level ACS), CDC, and CMS releases, updated quarterly within 30 days of upstream release. County-level trends are labeled when shown. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026.