Lewiston, Maine

Area Profile

38,324 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Lewiston, in Androscoggin County.

56out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 35% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 46% of 3,904 published cities58
Schools2438th of 2,668 published cities18
Growth1747th of 2,973 published cities45
Housing affordability2264th of 4,223 published cities78
Climate4117th of 4,223 published cities54
Physical resilienceTop 18% of 4,182 published cities84
Access4122nd of 4,226 published cities44
Economic stability3242nd of 4,226 published cities44
The quick read

Unemployment is 3.2% and median household income $55,393, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published city profiles.

Residential permitting has slowed: 38 units authorized over the past twelve months, 80% below the prior year.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published city profiles, placing Lewiston in the top 18% for physical resilience.

At a glance

Population
38,324
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$55,393
Bottom 31% nationally
Density
1,122/sq mi
34.1 sq mi of land
Median age
37.3
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Androscoggin County
Maine
Metro area
Lewiston-Auburn, ME
Nearest major airport
BGR
83 mi · Bangor Intl
Median home value
$235,100
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 3.2% is lower than 92% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment fell 1.1% over the past year, to 16,682 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$4,316$55,393Bottom 31%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,549$30,979Bottom 40%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate20.0%Top 24%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute22.4 minBottom 28%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher22.6%Top 45%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment16,682Bottom 18%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)0.1%Top 47%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-1.1%Bottom 42%June 2026
Labor force17,229Bottom 18%June 2026
Labor force participation61.1%Top 48%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$62,640Bottom 25%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$49,540Bottom 38%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)-0.5%Bottom 17%June 2026
Unemployment rate3.2%Bottom 8%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/066.22.7
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 3.2% 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
202120222023202457k48k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $55,393 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 — Lewiston-Auburn, ME
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Home Health and Personal Care Aides1,870$38,240
Fast Food and Counter Workers1,490$34,720
Retail Salespersons1,430$36,540
Registered Nurses1,280$85,870
Stockers and Order Fillers1,210$40,680
Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers1,080$57,900

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.

52% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 64% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 11.9 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
9
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
11.9
across all schools here
Math proficiency
52.4%
Bottom 1% in Maine
Reading proficiency
64.1%
Bottom 1% in Maine
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Lewiston High SchoolLewiston Public Schools1,70914.7
Lewiston Middle SchoolLewiston Public Schools74411.869%78%
Robert V. Connors Elementary SchoolLewiston Public Schools73710.032%49%
Montello SchoolLewiston Public Schools67511.834%49%
Raymond A. Geiger Elementary SchoolLewiston Public Schools57211.072%79%
Thomas J McMahon Elementary SchLewiston Public Schools4749.140%62%
Farwell Elementary SchoolLewiston Public Schools40110.352%61%
Acadia Academy School · charterAcadia Academy25016.792%86%
Lewiston Regional Technology CtrLewiston Public Schools0

61.9% 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 Maine’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 $986 takes 21% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 4.2 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
21.4%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
4.2×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$986
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$235,100
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income4.24Top 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate51.2%Bottom 10%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±48717,105Top 3%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$44$986Top 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$7,810$235,100Top 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income21.4%Top 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate5.9%Bottom 33%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
45/ 100
Ranks 1747 of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is increasing — 2 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 4% since 2020, reaching 38,772 in 2024.

63% of recently permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes, so new supply is concentrated in apartments and condominiums rather than detached houses.

At 1.0 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
38
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
1.0
Bottom 31% nationally
Year over year
−80%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
63.2%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202439k37k
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
20202021202220232024202518420
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was higher than 2020 (+426%).

Weather & climate

4 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 79°F and January a low of 12°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 50.0 inches, including 66.8 inches of snow.

Air quality measures a median index of 31, in the Good band, and no day in the year passed 100.

0°20°40°60°80°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station BRUNSWICK NAS, 17.7 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND6.0"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index47.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation50.0"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall66.8"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low12°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high79°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months41991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10002024 calendar year
Median air quality index31.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing48°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
31
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
47
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

84 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are hurricane, ice storm and earthquake.

Ice stormHigh
HurricaneElevated
DroughtElevated
EarthquakeModerate
LightningModerate
Heat waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, inland flooding, landslide, hail, strong wind, cold wave, wildfire, tornado.

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.

Androscoggin County records 1.6 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 19.3 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 31.6 per 100,000 residents in Androscoggin County.

Homicide
1.6
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
19.3
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
31.6
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
19.3
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 Androscoggin 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 Lewiston rather than Lewiston 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

1 major airport lies within 100 miles, the nearest 83 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Bangor IntlBGR83 mi11,440 ft
Manchester Boston RgnlMHT102 mi9,250 ft
General Edward Lawrence Logan IntlBOS126 mi10,083 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
56
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Other cities in Lewiston-Auburn, ME

Same metropolitan area, measured the same way
CityCountyPopulationArea ScoreCompare
AuburnAndroscoggin County24,60267vs Lewiston

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 Lewiston

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
0424038,324$55,39356