Athens County, OH

County Profile

61,737 residents. Safety, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Athens County, OH.

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.

45out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 5% of 1,225 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity1087th of 1,255 counties35
Schools803rd of 973 counties24
Growth1029th of 1,226 counties31
Housing affordability665th of 1,255 counties92
ClimateTop 45% of 1,254 counties70
Physical resilience1073rd of 1,255 counties29
Access960th of 1,255 counties67
Economic stability1084th of 1,255 counties34
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published profiles: unemployment is 5.0% and the Opportunity signal places Athens County in the bottom 13%.

In the public schools here, 43% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 13.7 students for every teacher.

Physical-risk exposure is above the national median, driven mainly by inland flooding, tornado and hail.

At a glance

Population
61,737
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$56,001
Bottom 25% nationally
Density
123/sq mi
503.6 sq mi of land
Median age
33.2
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Athens County
Ohio
Metro area
Athens, OH
Nearest major airport
LCK
58 mi · Rickenbacker Intl
Median home value
$185,000
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 5.0% is lower than 22% of the 1,255 measured US locations.

Employment fell 2.4% over the past year, to 23,674 employed residents.

35% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 86% of measured US locations.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$2,207$56,001Bottom 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,648$30,645Bottom 28%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate21.5%Top 13%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute24.2 minBottom 39%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher34.9%Top 14%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment23,674Bottom 30%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)0.4%Top 48%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-2.4%Bottom 14%June 2026
Labor force24,921Bottom 31%June 2026
Labor force participation57.4%Bottom 43%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)-1.3%Bottom 1%June 2026
Unemployment rate5.0%Top 22%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/066.83.6
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 5.0% 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
202120222023202456k47k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $56,001 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.

43% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 51% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 13.7 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
18
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
13.7
across all schools here
Math proficiency
43.0%
Bottom 8% in Ohio
Reading proficiency
50.9%
Bottom 17% in Ohio
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Alexander Jr. / Sr. High SchoolAlexander Local69313.362%72%
Athens High SchoolAthens City School District68515.2
Alexander Elementary SchoolAlexander Local66915.233%49%
Tri-County Career Center BuildingTri-County Career Center59014.4
The Plains Intermediate SchoolAthens City School District50017.226%40%
Nelsonville-York Elementary SchoolNelsonville-York City47711.638%39%
Morrison Gordon Elementary SchoolAthens City School District39318.758%68%
Athens Middle SchoolAthens City School District36011.672%67%
Trimble Elementary SchoolTrimble Local33313.323%29%
East Elementary SchoolAthens City School District32913.761%68%
Nelsonville-York High SchoolNelsonville-York City26013.0
Nelsonville-York Junior High SchoolNelsonville-York City23912.617%32%

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 Ohio’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 $939 takes 20% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.3 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
20.1%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.3×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$939
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$185,000
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income3.30Top 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate60.4%Bottom 7%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±14126,471Top 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$46$939Top 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$10,740$185,000Top 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income20.1%Top 20%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate13.1%Bottom 44%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
31/ 100
Ranks 1029 of 1,226 published city profiles
Permitting is increasing, 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 grown 1% since 2020, reaching 63,218 in 2024.

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

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

67% 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 0.8 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US locations.

Units permitted
51
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.8
Bottom 12% nationally
Year over year
−7%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
66.7%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202463k59k
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
2022202320242025855.0
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2022 (−20%).

Weather & climate

6 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 87°F and January a low of 24°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 44.2 inches, including 11.3 inches of snow.

Air quality measures a median index of 28, 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 PARKERSBURG, 26.4 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.9"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index49.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation44.2"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall11.3"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low24°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high87°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months61991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10002024 calendar year
Median air quality index28.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing44°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
28
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
49
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

29 / 100
Physical resilience

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

Inland floodingHigh
Ice stormModerate
HailModerate
TornadoModerate

Low or minimal exposure: landslide, heat wave, lightning, strong wind, hurricane, earthquake, drought, winter weather, cold wave, wildfire.

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.

Athens 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 13.6 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 23.9 per 100,000 residents in Athens County.

Homicide
0.0
per 100,000 residents
Firearm deaths, all intents
13.6
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
23.9
per 100,000 residents
Suicide
20.7
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 Athens 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 Athens County rather than Athens 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

3 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 58 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Rickenbacker IntlLCK58 mi11,902 ft
John Glenn Columbus IntlCMH64 mi10,114 ft
Wilmington Air ParkILN93 mi10,701 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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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 Athens County, OH