West Hartford is no longer Connecticut’s best place to live, Niche says

If you come upon the king, you better not miss. And Old Greenwich He didn’t.

After West Hartford spent eight years straight The suburb of Hartford, which was at the top of Niche’s annual “Best Places to Live in Connecticut” rankings, fell to second place this year after being overshadowed by global warming. Gold Coast neighborhood of Old Greenwich.

Overall, Connecticut’s national rankings declined from last year; the best towns had lower placements and fewer high scores.

Greenwich neighborhood, with a population of 6,936, covers a small area of ​​land in the eastern part of the town. Earned an A+ overall gradealso with an A+ grade “Public Schools” categories“Family-Friendly” and “Health and Fitness.” However, according to Niche, it ranked B- or below for Cost of Living, Diversity, Housing, and Weather.

Nationally, Old Greenwich was “ranked #988”The Best Place to Live in America” list and No. 448 in the best suburbs rankings. Both are declines from last year, when West Hartford broke into the top 200 overall. Niche’s top place to live nationwide was Atlantic Station, a neighborhood in Atlanta, GA.

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After Old Greenwich and West Hartford, the rest of Connecticut’s top 10 consisted largely of other neighborhoods of Greenwich (Riverside 3rd and Cos Cob 5th) or suburbs of Hartford (Avon 4th, Simsbury 7th, Farmington 8th, Glastonbury 9th, South Windsor 10th); the only exception was sixth-place Westport.

Niche makes the list drawing a extensive census dataThe most important factors are cost of living, proportion of residents with college degrees, quality of housing, and Niche’s own rankings for area public schools.

Connecticut’s best places to live bear this out, with universally high scores for schools and families; however, Hartford area locales generally scored higher than their Greenwich counterparts for housing and cost of living.

Each of the towns in Niche’s top 10 statewide were also whiter, more highly educated, and had higher median income and median home values ​​than the state average. According to AdvanceCT data.

Coming from Connecticut, the list includes: pockets of extreme wealth, became insistent And widening wealth and income gapslargely divided along racial and geographic lines.

In total, 14 locations in Connecticut earned an A+ rating on Niche’s list, up from 22 in 2025.

At the other end of the spectrum, Connecticut’s lowest-scoring areas were three small towns in the state’s northeast: Hampton, Sterling, Union, and the Hartford neighborhoods of North Meadows and South Meadows.

This article was first published at: Niche says West Hartford is no longer Connecticut’s best place to live.