Dover, the state capital · Photo: Tim Kiser (w:User:Malepheasant) · CC BY-SA 2.5How Delaware stacks up
Delaware spends more per pupil than most states (10th), but its students score 47th on the Nation’s Report Card. The good news is high home ownership (73% of homes owner-occupied) and the 13th lowest property-tax bills in the country; the bad news, above-average crime. Weighed together, that earns a C (34 of 100), 34th among the states.
Each subject puts the official state figure beside a measure built from our town grades. How this works
Safety
43rd of 51C−16/100 Crime runs high here. Many places report no crime of their own, so the town figures cover 72% of residents. Measured by the FBI, violent crime here comes to 352 per 100,000 residents. Few residents live in a top-quarter town; its best showing is Middletown, #1,730 nationally.
Counting property crime too (property + 4 × violent, the weighting our town grades use): 23rd highest.
Source: FBI Crime Data Explorer, state estimate 2025.
Measure: reported crime per resident over the engine’s three crime years (property + 4 × violent), as in our Safety grades. 6 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 3,410 nationally. Covers 72% of residents of Delaware’s 10,000+ towns.
Crime gathers in the larger cities
Its safest larger towns are Newark (#2,195), Smyrna (#2,686) and Milford (#3,167), ranked against every U.S. town of 10,000+. At the other end are Wilmington, Dover and Milford, in the quarter of U.S. towns reporting the most crime per resident.
| State | Safest quarter | Most-crime quarter | Split |
|---|---|---|---|
| New Hampshire | 42% | 0% | |
| Rhode Island | 37% | 0% | |
| New Jersey | 35% | 20% | |
| Pennsylvania | 29% | 37% | |
| Maine | 29% | 15% | |
| Delaware | 0% | 72% |
A big gap in the town figures
Each town’s figure is built from its own department’s FBI reports, so towns with gaps sit out rather than being estimated. Here the towns counted hold 72% of residents of towns of 10,000+. In Bear, Glasgow, Brookside and two other places, county or state police answer the calls, so there is no town figure. Next door, coverage runs from 28% in Maryland to 84% in Pennsylvania.
Schools
40th of 51C−22/100 Weaker test results than most. Spending ranks 10th; results rank 47th. 26% of its 4th and 8th graders reach Proficient on the Nation’s Report Card, against 31% nationally (5th lowest). Top-quarter towns are rare here; Middletown comes closest at #1,596.
In the class of 2023, 88.9% graduated on time, 11th highest; graduation counts as much as test results in the grade.
Spending: $22,312 per pupil, 10th highest. Shown for context, not graded.
Source: NCES, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) 2024, public schools; EDFacts graduation rates; Census school finance.
Measure: graduation rate and test results, averaged; each district’s state-test proficiency is put on the NAEP yardstick (its result ÷ the state average × the state’s NAEP proficiency) so districts compare across states. 11 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 5,230 nationally.
Cost of living
13th of 51A−76/100 Affordable nearly everywhere. Compared with $3,119 nationally, the typical tax bill here is $1,768. Almost no one here lives in a bottom-quarter town; Wilmington and Brookside are typical. Taxes and prices disagree: 13th lowest tax bills, but home prices 17th highest against income.
Against income, home values rank 17th highest: 4.1 times the median household’s.
Source: Census ACS 2020–24 5-year.
Measure: our cost-of-living score: home value, rent and tax bill against area income, plus the share paying 30%+ for housing. 11 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 5,235 nationally.
Health
32nd of 51C+38/100 Slightly worse health than average. 51% of residents live in bottom-quarter towns, among them Wilmington and Dover. Delaware ranks 23rd highest for adults in fair or poor health, at 19%. Every neighbor scores higher, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey among them.
Source: CDC PLACES 2025 release (BRFSS model estimates).
Measure: our health score: seven CDC PLACES measures (general, physical and mental health, obesity, diabetes, smoking, inactivity). 11 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 5,218 nationally.
Housing
7th of 51A88/100 Ownership above most states. Big places drag it down: Wilmington and Dover rank in the national bottom quarter. 73% of homes are lived in by their owners, against 65% nationally (5th highest).
Source: Census ACS 2020–24 5-year.
Measure: share of occupied homes that are owner-occupied. 11 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 5,235 nationally.
Natural hazards
18th of 51B+66/100 A bit less exposed than most. FEMA puts 72% of the expected losses on inland flooding. Inland flooding drives 72% of the $114 a year FEMA expects natural hazards to cost per $100,000 of buildings (17th lowest). Town by town it lands near the middle, with Dover its best at #1,223 of 5,239.
Federal major-disaster declarations, 2015–2025: 3, 3rd fewest.
Share of expected building damage: inland flooding 72%, hurricane 14%, coastal flooding 7%.
Source: FEMA National Risk Index v1.20 (Dec. 2025): expected annual building loss over building value, all census tracts; FEMA disaster declarations.
Measure: FEMA National Risk Index: expected yearly building loss from 18 natural hazards, as a share of building value. 11 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 5,239 nationally.
Commute
33rd of 51C+36/100 Commutes a bit longer than average. Workers spend 26.0 minutes getting to work, the 18th longest commute among the states. Among its neighbors it does best on commute times, with Pennsylvania second. Commutes stretch longest from Middletown.
Source: Census ACS 2020–24 5-year.
Measure: average one-way commute of the town’s workers. 11 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 5,235 nationally.
Growth
20th of 51B62/100 Steady growth. Wilmington and Newark weigh on the town measure; 42% of residents live in bottom-quarter places. The population grew 10.2% between the 2010 and 2020 censuses, against 7.4% nationally (14th fastest). It leads its neighbors on growth, ahead of Maryland.
Building: 7.1 new homes permitted per 1,000 residents in 2025, 10th most.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2010 and 2020 decennial counts; Census building permits.
Measure: population change between the 2010 and 2020 censuses. 11 Delaware towns of 10,000+ against 5,079 nationally.
How Delaware compares to its neighbors
Against Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, Delaware leads on cost of living, the commute and growth but trails on safety, schools and health.
| Delaware | Maryland | Pennsylvania | New Jersey | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | C 3434th of 51 | B− 4628th of 51 | A 887th of 51 | A− 7613th of 51 |
| Safety | C− 1632nd official · 0% in top towns | C− 2434th official · 1% in top towns | A 8816th official · 29% in top towns | A 946th official · 35% in top towns |
| Schools | C− 2247th official · 0% in top towns | B 5820th official · 11% in top towns | A 8812th official · 38% in top towns | A+ 1002nd official · 38% in top towns |
| Cost of living | A− 7613th official · 32% in top towns | C+ 4039th official · 25% in top towns | B 5833rd official · 43% in top towns | D 851st official · 3% in top towns |
| Health | C+ 3829th official · 9% in top towns | A− 7618th official · 29% in top towns | B 6227th official · 23% in top towns | A− 8412th official · 41% in top towns |
| Housing | A 885th official · 10% in top towns | A− 8223rd official · 21% in top towns | A 9017th official · 26% in top towns | B 5840th official · 30% in top towns |
| Natural hazards | B+ 6617th official · 15% in top towns | A+ 982nd official · 98% in top towns | A− 7811th official · 39% in top towns | B 5624th official · 10% in top towns |
| Commute | C+ 3634th official · 15% in top towns | D− 250th official · 1% in top towns | C 3036th official · 15% in top towns | D− 049th official · 1% in top towns |
| Growth | B 6214th official · 27% in top towns | B 5623rd official · 27% in top towns | D 844th official · 9% in top towns | C+ 3826th official · 12% in top towns |
Each cell: the subject’s grade and score, the state’s rank on the official figure (1st = the better end), and the share of residents of 10,000+ towns living in a nationally top-quarter town. Neighbor names open their report cards.
How this report card works
Two measures, side by side. The left card is the figure a state agency or federal survey publishes for the whole state, ranked against the other 49 states and D.C. The right card is built from our town grades: of everyone living in the state’s towns and cities of 10,000+, the share whose town falls in the national top quarter of 10,000+ towns. A state can do well on one and not the other; that difference is often the story.
Scores and grades. Each subject’s score (0–100) is the state’s standing among the 50 states and D.C.: the two measures’ percentiles averaged, then ranked again, the same method as our town grades. 100 is the best state, 0 the last. Letters use the town-grade scale (A+ from 95, A from 85, A− from 75 … D below 15). The overall score weighs safety 18, cost of living 18, schools 16, health 14, commute 10, housing 8, natural hazards 8, growth 8 (out of 100). D.C., a single city, is left out of the town measure and graded on official figures alone.
What it is not. A state figure averages everyone, so it cannot show whether a state is evenly good or a mix of very good and struggling places. The town measure shows the mix but leaves out towns under 10,000 and towns missing data. Neither says anything about any one neighborhood.
Schools use the Nation’s Report Card because each state’s own tests are set to different bars. Hazards use FEMA’s expected building damage, the same loss rate behind our town hazard grades. Sources are named under each figure. How grades work