Boone County, MO

County Profile

188,043 residents. Safety, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Boone County, MO.

Several figures AreaProfile publishes are measured by county and nowhere finer — death rates by intent among them. On this page those describe the geography they are printed on, which is not true of the city and ZIP pages that inherit them.

68out of 100
Area Score
Top 28% of 1,225 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 9% of 1,255 counties80
Schools666th of 973 counties36
GrowthTop 27% of 1,226 counties63
Housing affordability671st of 1,255 counties92
ClimateTop 36% of 1,254 counties72
Physical resilienceTop 23% of 1,255 counties79
Access1228th of 1,255 counties9
Economic stabilityTop 45% of 1,255 counties65
The quick read

Boone County ranks in the top 9% of published profiles for employment opportunity, with unemployment at 3.6% and median household income of $72,758.

Residential permitting has slowed: 961 units authorized over the past twelve months, 23% below the prior year.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published profiles, placing Boone County in the top 23% for physical resilience.

At a glance

Population
188,043
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$72,758
Top 31% nationally
Density
274/sq mi
685.6 sq mi of land
Median age
32.7
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Boone County
Missouri
Metro area
Columbia, MO
Nearest major airport
STL
106 mi · St Louis Lambert Intl
Median home value
$272,800
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 3.6% is lower than 75% of the 1,255 measured US locations.

Employment grew 1.5% over the past year, to 98,899 employed residents.

52% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 97% of measured US locations.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$1,612$72,758Top 31%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,162$40,954Top 22%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate16.6%Top 31%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute20.1 minBottom 15%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher51.5%Top 3%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment98,899Top 26%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)2.3%Top 26%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)1.5%Top 10%June 2026
Labor force102,594Top 26%June 2026
Labor force participation66.5%Top 12%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)-0.4%Bottom 23%June 2026
Unemployment rate3.6%Bottom 25%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/064.01.6
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 3.6% 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
202120222023202473k63k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $72,758 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 — Columbia, MO
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Registered Nurses3,680$84,330
General and Operations Managers3,440$75,410
Home Health and Personal Care Aides3,000$36,860
Retail Salespersons2,610$31,390
Cooks, Fast Food2,470$29,110
Cashiers2,340$29,910

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.

32% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 43% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 13.3 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
55
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
13.3
across all schools here
Math proficiency
31.6%
Bottom 23% in Missouri
Reading proficiency
43.1%
Bottom 29% in Missouri
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
DAVID H. HICKMAN HIGHCOLUMBIA 932,00715.9
ROCK BRIDGE SR. HIGHCOLUMBIA 931,99718.3
MURIEL BATTLE HIGH SCHOOLCOLUMBIA 931,49213.6
ANN HAWKINS GENTRY MID. SCHOOLCOLUMBIA 9373613.132%52%
BEULAH RALPH ELEMENTARYCOLUMBIA 9365615.351%61%
SOUTHERN BOONE MIDDLESOUTHERN BOONE CO. R-I64813.527%42%
MARY PAXTON KEELEY ELEM.COLUMBIA 9361915.544%49%
SMITHTON MIDDLECOLUMBIA 9360512.332%42%
JEFFERSON MIDDLE SCHOOLCOLUMBIA 9359311.947%57%
OAKLAND MIDDLE SCHOOLCOLUMBIA 9358910.917%27%
MILL CREEK ELEM.COLUMBIA 9358317.762%62%
JOHN WARNER MIDDLE SCHOOLCOLUMBIA 9357912.637%67%

37.5% 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 Missouri’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 $1,088 takes 18% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.7 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
17.9%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.7×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,088
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$272,800
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income3.75Top 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate57.7%Bottom 5%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±13481,675Top 12%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$21$1,088Top 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$6,516$272,800Top 24%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income17.9%Top 39%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate6.3%Bottom 11%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
63/ 100
Top 27% of 1,226 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing, 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 192,154 in 2024.

Permitting has turned downward after moving the other way the year before.

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

At 5.1 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is above the median for measured US locations.

Units permitted
961
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
5.1
Top 29% nationally
Year over year
−23%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
35.5%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
20202021202220232024192k184k
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
2020202120222023202420251k656
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2020 (−15%).

Weather & climate

7 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 89°F and January a low of 23°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 41.4 inches, including 16.5 inches of snow.

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

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station COLUMBIA RGNL AP, 12.9 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.9"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index48.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation41.4"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall16.5"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low23°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high89°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10002024 calendar year
Median air quality index39.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing48°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
39
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
48
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

79 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding, heat wave and cold wave.

Heat waveModerate
Winter weatherModerate
Inland floodingModerate
EarthquakeElevated
Ice stormModerate
Cold waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: lightning, tornado, strong wind, landslide, hail, wildfire, drought, hurricane.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA National Risk Index county record. 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.

Boone County records 6.9 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, higher than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 16.4 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 11.1 per 100,000 residents in Boone County.

Homicide
6.9
per 100,000 residents
Firearm deaths, all intents
16.4
per 100,000 residents
Drug overdose
11.1
per 100,000 residents
Suicide
11.6
per 100,000 residents

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 Boone 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 Boone County rather than Boone County 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

No airport meeting the AreaProfile major-airport definition lies within 100 miles; the nearest is 106 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
St Louis Lambert IntlSTL106 mi11,020 ft
St Louis RgnlALN122 mi8,099 ft
Kansas City IntlMCI131 mi10,801 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
68
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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
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.

Cities in Boone County, MO