Most American Millennials Live Within 100 Miles of Their Hometown

The stereotypical Millennial flees their hometown at the earliest opportunity to pursue a glamorous job in some far-flung city (at least according to Hallmark Channel original movies). According to a recent study, this trope isn’t an accurate representation of the truth. The majority of Millennials live within a 100-mile radius of where they grew up, according to the Associated Press.

In 2022, the U.S. Census Bureau and Harvard University researchers looked at decennial census, survey, and tax data to determine the geographical range of young-ish adults in the U.S. By age 26, more than two-thirds of the group being analyzed still resided in the area where they grew up. Even Millennials who left the nest didn’t fly far from home. The study found that 80 percent lived within 100 miles of their hometown, and 90 percent lived within 500 miles.

Where do Millennials live?

Millennials who moved more than a car ride away from where they grew up were likely to end up in major cities, like New York, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C. Economic mobility was a deciding factor for many adults who chose to stick close to home. College graduates with a degree and a financial safety net may benefit from moving to a city with more job opportunities. For people without those advantages, the risk of moving away from their community is often too great. The study found that Black and Latino individuals were more likely to stay close to home in adulthood, while white and Asian Millennials migrated greater distances. Young adults with wealthy parents were more likely to move far away than those from lower-income families.

Work is one of the major reasons people relocate, but some parts of the country are more welcoming to job seekers than others. If you’re looking for a change, here are the best cities for landing a job in the U.S.

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A version of this story originally ran in 2022; it has been updated for 2024.