Winfield, Kansas

Area Profile

11,711 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Winfield, in Cowley County.

52out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 20% of 2,944 profiles measured

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity3632nd of 3,904 cities measured31
Schools1653rd of 2,668 cities measured42
Growth2494th of 2,973 cities measured29
Housing affordabilityTop 8% of 4,223 cities measured100
Climate2780th of 4,223 cities measured65
Physical resilience2291st of 4,182 cities measured53
Access3119th of 4,226 cities measured83
Economic stability3786th of 4,226 cities measured33
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published city profiles: unemployment is 4.8% and the Opportunity signal places Winfield in the bottom 7%.

Residential permitting has slowed: 10 units authorized over the past twelve months, 17% below the prior year.

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles: rent takes 17% of median household income and the median home is 2.3 times it.

At a glance

Population
11,711
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$56,656
Bottom 34% nationally
Density
1,051/sq mi
11.1 sq mi of land
Median age
38.9
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Cowley County
Kansas
Metro area
Arkansas City-Winfield, KS
Nearest major airport
BEC
34 mi · Beech Factory
Median home value
$132,700
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.8% is lower than 32% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment fell 2.1% over the past year, to 14,518 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Median household income ±$7,908$56,656Bottom 34%of 29,5732024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$10,079$35,969Top 43%of 31,4202024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate15.4%Top 35%of 31,9002024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute21.5 minBottom 23%of 31,5432024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher27.8%Top 34%of 31,9192024 ACS 5-Year
Employment14,518Bottom 13%of 3,904June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-3.9%Bottom 7%of 3,903June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-2.1%Bottom 17%of 3,904June 2026
Labor force15,246Bottom 13%of 3,904June 2026
Labor force participation55.7%Bottom 35%of 31,9332024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.1%Top 49%of 3,904June 2026
Unemployment rate4.8%Top 32%of 3,904June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202458k50k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $56,656 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.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes city-level labor data only for places of 25,000 or more. This is the figure for Cowley County, KS, which contains this city.

23% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 32% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 12.5 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
8
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
12.5
across all schools here
Math proficiency
23.3%
Bottom 30% in Kansas
Reading proficiency
31.9%
Bottom 33% in Kansas
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Winfield HighWinfield63811.4
Winfield Middle SchoolWinfield45612.717%32%
Whittier ElemWinfield25914.435%38%
Irving ElemWinfield23413.817%22%
Lowell ElemWinfield21413.421%38%
Central ElemCentral16218.042%50%
Central Jr-Sr HighCentral1398.710%10%
Country View ElemWinfield11412.729%30%

56.0% 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 Kansas’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 $786 takes 17% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 2.3 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
16.6%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.3×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$786
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$132,700
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Home price to income2.34Bottom 33%of 28,4732024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate64.7%Bottom 28%of 31,8432024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±2635,367Top 11%of 32,3302024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$114$786Bottom 26%of 23,4322024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$21,135$132,700Bottom 32%of 29,3422024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income16.6%Bottom 36%of 23,2012024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate16.8%Top 30%of 32,0012024 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
29/ 100
Ranks 2494 of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing — 2 consecutive years, measured from 2022 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 fallen 1% since 2020, reaching 11,678 in 2024.

New construction is predominantly single-family: only 0% of permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes.

At 0.9 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
10
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.9
Bottom 28% nationally
Year over year
−17%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202412k12k
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
2022202320242025327.0
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2022 (−36%).

Weather & climate

6 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 92°F and January a low of 24°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 34.9 inches.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station WINFIELD STROTHER FLD AP, 6.0 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND5.3"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation34.9"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low24°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high92°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months61991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing47°F1991-2020 Normals

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.

Physical risk

53 / 100
Physical resilience

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

WildfireHigh
TornadoModerate
Ice stormModerate
Strong windElevated
HailElevated
Heat waveModerate
Winter weatherModerate
DroughtModerate
Inland floodingModerate

Low or minimal exposure: cold wave, landslide, lightning, earthquake, hurricane.

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.

Cowley County records 0.0 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, lower than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 15.1 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 14.7 per 100,000 residents in Cowley County.

Homicide
0.0
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
15.1
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
14.7
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
19.2
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 Cowley 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 Winfield rather than Winfield 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

4 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 34 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Beech FactoryBEC34 mi8,001 ft
Wichita Dwight D Eisenhower NtlICT38 mi10,302 ft
Enid Woodring RgnlWDG75 mi8,613 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
52
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Other cities in Arkansas City-Winfield, KS

Same metropolitan area, measured the same way
CityCountyPopulationArea ScoreCompare
Arkansas CityCowley County11,88446vs Winfield

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
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

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 Winfield

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
6715614,513$58,82152