QoL Rank
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South Dakota

South Dakota has a quality of life score of 62/100 (B, good) and ranks #12 of 51 states. Its strongest category is cost of living (82) and its weakest is education (42). Its top-rated larger counties are Lincoln County, Union County, Yankton County.

  • Safety: 51
  • Cost of living: 82
  • Education: 42
  • Quality of life: 71

Key figures: violent crime 320.3 per 100,000 people a year (US 345.2); median rent $946 a month; median home value $257,400; median household income $72,794; life expectancy 76.8 years.

Counties in South Dakota, best first

  1. Marshall County 82
  2. Perkins County 81
  3. Edmunds County 81
  4. Kingsbury County 80
  5. McCook County 80
  6. Faulk County 79
  7. McPherson County 79
  8. Potter County 79
  9. Hamlin County 78
  10. Hanson County 77
  11. Day County 76
  12. Miner County 76
  13. Hutchinson County 75
  14. Lincoln County 74
  15. Union County 74
  16. Yankton County 74
  17. Aurora County 73
  18. Deuel County 73
  19. Spink County 72
  20. Hand County 71
  21. Moody County 71
  22. Davison County 69
  23. Brookings County 69
  24. Stanley County 68
  25. Jerauld County 68
  26. Brown County 68
  27. Clark County 67
  28. Minnehaha County 67
  29. Meade County 67
  30. Brule County 67
  31. Turner County 67
  32. Codington County 66
  33. Lake County 66
  34. Walworth County 65
  35. Tripp County 64
  36. Hughes County 64
  37. Gregory County 64
  38. Sanborn County 64
  39. Lawrence County 62
  40. Clay County 61
  41. Grant County 59
  42. Charles Mix County 59
  43. Hyde County 58
  44. Bon Homme County 57
  45. Custer County 56
  46. Beadle County 55
  47. Fall River County 53
  48. Haakon County 53
  49. Roberts County 52
  50. Pennington County 52
  51. Corson County 49
  52. Lyman County 49
  53. Butte County 47
  54. Mellette County 41
  55. Dewey County 40
  56. Bennett County 38
  57. Todd County 36
  58. Ziebach County 35
  59. Buffalo County 31
  60. Jackson County 30
  61. Oglala Lakota County 24
  62. Campbell County –
  63. Douglas County –
  64. Harding County –
  65. Jones County –
  66. Sully County –

Your priorities

Choose how much each category counts toward the overall score. The map, rankings and every place’s overall score update as you go.

About the data

Every county is compared with every other US county, and every state with the other states.

Each measure becomes a percentile from 0 to 100, where 100 is always best. For crime, deaths, disaster risk, costs and commutes, the lowest value is best. A category score averages its measures’ percentiles and is then scaled so all four categories have the same spread around 50, so each counts equally. The overall score is the average of the four. 50 is a typical place, and most land between 35 and 65. Your priorities lets you weight the categories differently.

Grades: A 65 and up, B 55–64, C 45–54, D 35–44, F under 35.

Each category lists a county’s own figures next to its state’s and the US figures. Under the state and US columns, Difference shows whether the county is higher or lower, as a share of that figure (hover for the exact gap). Rank shows where it ranks instead: “ranked 75%” means it does better than 75% of the counties in its state, or in the US. A green arrow or dot means the county does better, red means worse.

Compare puts any two places side by side, counties or states, in any state. The better value in each row is highlighted.

A county gets an overall score only if all four categories have data and at least 60% of the measures are present. Small counties often have suppressed data, and without this rule they rank at the top on just a few numbers. Top 10 lists only include counties with at least 10,000 people.

What’s measured

Limitations

Sources