Daytona Beach, Florida

Area Profile

78,992 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Daytona Beach, in Volusia County.

45out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 5% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity3204th of 3,904 published cities40
Schools2449th of 2,668 published cities18
GrowthTop 40% of 2,973 published cities56
Housing affordability3901st of 4,223 published cities46
ClimateTop 11% of 4,223 published cities82
Physical resilience3321st of 4,182 published cities25
Access2858th of 4,226 published cities86
Economic stability4093rd of 4,226 published cities25
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published city profiles: unemployment is 6.7% and the Opportunity signal places Daytona Beach in the bottom 18%.

Residential permitting has slowed: 422 units authorized over the past twelve months, 61% below the prior year.

Physical-risk exposure is above the national median, driven mainly by hurricane, wildfire and coastal flooding.

At a glance

Population
78,992
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$52,058
Bottom 26% nationally
Density
1,172/sq mi
67.4 sq mi of land
Median age
40.3
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Volusia County
Florida
Metro area
Deltona-Daytona Beach-Ormond Beach, FL
Nearest major airport
SFB
30 mi · Orlando Sanford Intl
Median home value
$287,700
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 6.7% is lower than 4% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment fell 0.3% over the past year, to 34,966 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$2,226$52,058Bottom 26%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,496$33,371Bottom 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate20.4%Top 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute22.9 minBottom 30%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher27.8%Top 34%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment34,966Bottom 42%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)1.6%Top 26%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-0.3%Top 35%June 2026
Labor force37,476Bottom 42%June 2026
Labor force participation51.4%Bottom 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$57,390Bottom 8%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$44,940Bottom 5%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)1.2%Top 2%June 2026
Unemployment rate6.7%Top 4%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/067.53.4
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 6.7% in June 2026. A break in the line is a month the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not publish for this area — it is left empty rather than estimated.
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202452k42k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $52,058 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.
Largest occupations — Deltona-Daytona Beach-Ormond Beach, FL
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Retail Salespersons8,780$33,370
Fast Food and Counter Workers7,240$28,660
Registered Nurses6,600$84,180
Cashiers6,070$29,950
Waiters and Waitresses5,920$35,440
General and Operations Managers4,800$91,710

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

40% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 40% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 19.2 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
18
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
19.2
across all schools here
Math proficiency
39.7%
Bottom 19% in Florida
Reading proficiency
39.6%
Bottom 15% in Florida
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
MAINLAND HIGH SCHOOLVOLUSIA1,96423.7
SEABREEZE HIGH SCHOOLVOLUSIA1,58721.7
CAMPBELL MIDDLE SCHOOLVOLUSIA96223.532%37%
DAVID C. HINSON SR. MIDDLE SCHOOLVOLUSIA92218.452%50%
SOUTH DAYTONA ELEMENTARY SCHOOLVOLUSIA79415.042%43%
WESTSIDE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLVOLUSIA77418.930%25%
RICHARD MILBURN ACADEMY · charterVOLUSIA77135.0
PALM TERRACE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLVOLUSIA69715.233%34%
BEACHSIDE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLVOLUSIA61815.456%53%
HOLLY HILL ELEMENTARYVOLUSIA60114.330%32%
TURIE T. SMALL ELEMENTARY SCHOOLVOLUSIA59719.335%29%
CHAMPION ELEMENTARY SCHOOLVOLUSIA53315.739%44%

67.2% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against Florida’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $1,328 takes 31% of median household income, above the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 5.5 times median household income here, well above the historic benchmark, at a level conventionally described as seriously unaffordable.

Rent as a share of income
30.6%
Above the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
5.5×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,328
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$287,700
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income5.53Top 11%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate47.5%Bottom 8%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±78542,158Top 1%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$46$1,328Top 26%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$12,063$287,700Top 30%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income30.6%Top 6%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate17.8%Top 28%2024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →
Development Momentum
56/ 100
Top 40% of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing — 3 consecutive years, measured from 2020 to 2025.

An AreaProfile calculation combining permit volume per resident, its direction over one and three years, population change and employment growth. Permit volume alone is not the measure.

Population has grown 19% since 2020, reaching 86,015 in 2024.

Permit activity has fallen for 3 consecutive years.

Population is still rising, but more slowly than in the preceding year.

At 5.3 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is above the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
422
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
5.3
Top 28% nationally
Year over year
−61%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
28.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202486k72k
Census Population Estimates Program, July 1 of each year. These annual estimates are designed for year-over-year comparison, unlike the ACS five-year figure shown as this profile's population.
Housing units permitted per year
202020222023202420252k953
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2020 (−33%).

Weather & climate

8 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 90°F and January a low of 49°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 51.3 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 39, in the Good band, and no day in the year passed 100.

40°60°80°100°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station DAYTONA BEACH INTL AP, 3.0 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND7.2"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index53.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation51.3"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low49°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high90°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months81991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10002024 calendar year
Median air quality index39.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing23°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
39
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
53
90th percentile index
Days above 100
0
unhealthy for sensitive groups

A comfortable median and a bad tail are different problems. Wildfire smoke and summer ozone show up in the worst tenth of days, not in the middle of the year.

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today. Air quality is measured rather than modelled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — roughly half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and the rest show nothing rather than an estimate. Air masses are regional, so a county reading describes the air over a place reasonably well, but it is still the county reading.

Physical risk

25 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are hurricane, wildfire and coastal flooding.

HurricaneElevated
WildfireModerate
Coastal floodingModerate
Cold waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: lightning, tornado, inland flooding, strong wind, heat wave, earthquake, landslide, hail, drought.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. City values are the population-weighted mean of the counties the city overlaps, using AreaProfile place-to-county land-area weights. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences. AreaProfile does not publish reported crime, and this is not a substitute for it — it says nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Volusia County records 2.5 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, near the middle of counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 16.6 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 21.3 per 100,000 residents in Volusia County.

Homicide
2.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
16.6
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
21.3
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
22.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths

Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.

Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Volusia County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city centre and a suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around Daytona Beach rather than Daytona Beach itself. That is why AreaProfile shows these figures and does not put them in the Area Score. Where fewer than ten deaths were recorded the count is suppressed at source, and a rate built on single figures moves sharply between releases. What this measure has that reported crime does not: a death certificate is filed whether or not the local police agency submitted a return that year, so the figures stay comparable between places and over time.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Reported crime
The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer is the only source for reported offences with national coverage and a published method, and it requires an API key AreaProfile does not hold. Arrest counts, news volume and commercial “safety scores” are not substituted in the meantime. What is published above under Safety is a different measurement — deaths rather than offences, from death certificates rather than police returns — and it covers no property crime at all.
Taxes
No tax dataset has met the source admission test for coverage, transparent methodology and update cadence. Nothing here is individualized tax advice.
Full cost of living
No public source publishes one with national coverage and a documented method. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings.

Access

5 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 30 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Orlando Sanford IntlSFB30 mi11,002 ft
Orlando IntlMCO54 mi10,000 ft
St AugustineSGJ55 mi8,001 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

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Area Score
45
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Other cities in Deltona-Daytona Beach-Ormond Beach, FL

Same metropolitan area, measured the same way
CityCountyPopulationArea ScoreCompare
Palm CoastFlagler County98,25857vs Daytona Beach
DeltonaVolusia County97,33450vs Daytona Beach
Port OrangeVolusia County64,76756vs Daytona Beach
Ormond BeachVolusia County43,97657vs Daytona Beach
DeLandVolusia County41,61154vs Daytona Beach
New Smyrna BeachVolusia County31,97454vs Daytona Beach
EdgewaterVolusia County23,62755vs Daytona Beach
DeBaryVolusia County22,86958vs Daytona Beach
Orange CityVolusia County14,37246vs Daytona Beach
South DaytonaVolusia County13,54352vs Daytona Beach
Holly HillVolusia County13,08449vs Daytona Beach

Every city here is measured on the same scale from the same source releases, so the comparison is like for like. A higher Area Score reflects AreaProfile’s standardized weighting rather than a judgment about which is the better place to live.

Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics
2025 OEWSAnnual (spring release)
DemographicsU.S. Census Bureau
Population Estimates Program
July 1, 2024 estimateAnnual (vintage released each spring)
DevelopmentU.S. Census Bureau
Building Permits Survey
12 months ending July 2026Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
safetyU.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics
Provisional county-level mortality by intent
April, 2025 to March, 2026Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them
ClimateU.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System
Daily Air Quality Index by county
2024 calendar yearAnnually, once a calendar year is complete

Profile recalculated August 30, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.

ZIP codes in Daytona Beach

5 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
3211437,747$41,73641
3211730,955$56,41946
3211922,348$56,86251
3211818,383$61,26650
3212411,409$92,61656