City rankings

Cities with Lowest Unemployment in Washington

Maltby ranks #1 in Washington for lowest unemployment at 1.4%.

This ranking orders all 50 qualifying Washington cities by unemployment rate, computed directly from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey and CDC PLACES datasets, never a blended or proprietary score. It is one of 9 single-metric rankings Areazine publishes for Washington, each answering one direct question from official federal data. Compare Maltby's standing against every other Washington city ranked below.

50
Cities ranked
1.4%
#1 Maltby
4.6%
Lowest, East Wenatchee

What this Washington ranking shows

According to the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS) 5-year estimates, the CDC PLACES population-level health analysis, and the CMS Hospital Compare quality data, Areazine ranks U.S. cities across more than 19,000 incorporated places, census-designated places, and consolidated city-county governments. State-level city rankings combine these federal datasets to produce intra-state comparisons across demographics, economics, health outcomes, and hospital quality.

Maltby leads 50 Washington cities at 1.4%, while East Wenatchee sits at the bottom with 4.6% - a total spread of 3.2% on unemployment rate. The top 5 occupy 44% of that range, indicating a moderate distribution with meaningful steps between rungs.

The median Washington city in this list sits at 4%, 2.6% behind Maltby. See our methodology for ranking construction, data vintage, refresh cadence, and the federal upstream tables we join, and triangulate via the 8 other Washington rankings below, cities that lead on multiple lenses are the most robust signals.

Top 5 - Lowest Unemployment

Top 5 Washington cities ranked by unemployment rate
Rank City unemployment rate Population
#1 Maltby 1.4% 11K
#2 Snoqualmie 2.6% 13K
#3 Artondale 2.6% 13K
#4 Bainbridge Island 2.7% 24K
#5 Bothell West 2.8% 17K

Does unemployment rate track with city size?

Lowest Unemployment vs. population, top 25 ranked cities

Source: U.S. Census Bureau (population), unemployment rate per methodology 2×2 strategic matrix plotting 25 entities by Population (X) and unemployment rate (Y), with a crosshair dividing the plot into four quadrants. Large & highSmall & highLarge & lowSmall & low 020,00040,00060,00080,000 12345 Population unemployment rate Lowest Unemployment vs. population, top 25 ranked cities
Source: U.S. Census Bureau (population), unemployment rate per methodology

Lowest Unemployment 50

1 Maltby
1.4%
2 Snoqualmie
2.6%
3 Artondale
2.6%
4 Bainbridge Island
2.7%
5 Bothell West
2.8%
6 Elk Plain
2.9%
7 Mercer Island
3%
8 Silver Firs
3%
9 Sammamish
3.1%
10 Mukilteo
3.1%
11 Ferndale
3.1%
12 Wenatchee
3.2%
13 Issaquah
3.3%
14 Poulsbo
3.4%
15 Bonney Lake
3.6%
16 Port Orchard
3.6%
17 Lynden
3.6%
18 Lake Morton-Berrydale
3.6%
19 Battle Ground
3.7%
20 Enumclaw
3.7%
21 Oak Harbor
3.8%
22 Kenmore
3.8%
23 Marysville
3.9%
24 Bothell
3.9%
25 Salmon Creek
3.9%
26 Camas
4%
27 Anacortes
4%
28 South Hill
4.1%
29 Edmonds
4.1%
30 Cottage Lake
4.1%
31 Covington
4.1%
32 Bellevue
4.2%
33 Mountlake Terrace
4.2%
34 Arlington
4.2%
35 Lynnwood
4.3%
36 Mill Creek East
4.3%
37 Martha Lake
4.3%
38 Woodinville
4.3%
39 Mill Creek
4.4%
40 Five Corners
4.4%
41 Lake Forest Park
4.4%
42 Lacey
4.5%
43 Spanaway
4.5%
44 Camano
4.5%
45 Lakeland North
4.5%
46 Seattle
4.6%
47 Kirkland
4.6%
48 Shoreline
4.6%
49 Moses Lake
4.6%
50 East Wenatchee
4.6%

More Washington Rankings 8

Community Wellbeing Score in Washington Most Affordable Cities in Washington Most Expensive Cities in Washington Highest Income Cities in Washington Largest Cities in Washington Fastest Growing Cities in Washington Most Educated Cities in Washington Youngest Cities in Washington
All cities in Washington → Compare Maltby vs Snoqualmie → All comparisons →

Reading this Washington ranking responsibly

Single-metric rankings are useful precisely because they are honest about what they measure. A "highest income" ranking does not tell you that the top-ranked city is the best place to live in Washington; it tells you that, among cities of population ten thousand and above in Washington that have a published median household income field in the most recent American Community Survey five-year estimates, this city has the highest such value. That precise definition matters, because composite "best places" lists from real-estate marketing sites and lifestyle magazines often combine income with subjective weights on schools, walkability, and amenities, producing a score whose components are not disclosed and whose ordering is not reproducible. Areazine's editorial commitment is to keep the underlying field, source, and vintage visible so the reader can audit any rank in this list against the canonical federal record.

Cross-checking against other rankings is a useful sanity test. A city that appears in the top ten on three or more different rankings, for example, highest income, most educated, and lowest poverty, is showing a robust signal across multiple independent dimensions. A city that appears in the top ten on only one ranking and middling on the others is showing a narrower signal, often driven by a single statistical artifact (a small population pulling the per-capita measure, a recent acquisition spike inflating median home value, an outlier survey year). The other nine Washington rankings linked above provide that cross-check at zero extra effort.

Data Sources

Population and economic data from the Census Bureau American Community Survey (2024 5-year estimates). Health data from the CDC PLACES (2023). Ranking computations use U.S. Census Bureau reference geographies. Crime statistics, where referenced, originate from the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting program (also accessible via the Crime Data Explorer).

Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.