Towering above

Dallas ranks No. 14 best city in U.S., says prestigious new report

Dallas towers over the rest.

Photo by Sean Pavone/iStock

According to a new report, Dallas is one of America's best. A new study from Best Cities, powered by Resonance Consultancy, puts Dallas at No. 14 among the best cities in the U.S.

What lifts Dallas to the No. 14 spot? These are some of the factors cited by Best Cities:

Location of more than 10,000 corporate headquarters
Strong showing (No. 2) in the airport connectivity category
Kudos for the soon-to-be-expanded Kay Bailey Hutchinson Convention Center Dallas
Home of the country’s sixth largest LGBTQ+ community
Presence of the 28-block, 68-acre Dallas Arts District

"It’s not only city sloganeering that’s big in Dallas. It’s economic reality," the report says. "'Big Things Happen Here' can refer to any one of investment, population growth, or cultural ascent in The Big D."

Best Cities bases its list of the best U.S. cities on Resonance Consultancy’s combination of statistical performance plus qualitative evaluations by locals and visitors. Those figures are grouped into six main categories. This year’s ranking features 100 U.S. cities. To come up with the ranking, Resonance Consultancy assessed all U.S. metro areas with at least 500,000 residents.

Austin is right behind Dallas, at No. 15, and Houston comes out slightly ahead, at No. 11. Two other Texas cities make the Best Cities list: No. 34 San Antonio and No. 94 McAllen.

Here are some of the individual rankings that contribute to Houston’s 11th-place finish:

No. 4 for restaurants
No. 7 for culture
No. 8 for foreign-born population

“Educated, diverse and hard-working, Houston is America’s stealthy powerhouse on the rise,” Best Cities proclaims.

Best Cities also notes that while Austin grabs much of the best-city attention, “the promise of the Lone Star State drawing Californians and New Yorkers is quietly being fulfilled in Houston.” The website points out that the Houston metro area has gained nearly 300,000 residents in the past year, thanks to both domestic and international migration.

Best Cities praises Austin as “a place that’s incredibly livable. Talk to any entrepreneur leaving Silicon Valley or Seattle and chances are they’ve considered Austin.”

The website points to a number of Austin’s assets, such as:

Growing presence of Fortune 500 headquarters
Comparatively low unemployment rate
Location of the University of Texas’ flagship campus
Status as the Live Music Capital of the World
Home of the annual SXSW gathering

So, which U.S. city tops the rest? That honor goes to New York.

"After a hellish two years, few places on the planet are as ready to relaunch as NYC," they say.

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college ranking news

SMU declared No. 1 university in Dallas-Fort Worth in new 2027 ranking

SMU/Facebook

Go Mustangs!

Education ranking and review website Niche has released its 2027 rankings of the best colleges in the U.S., and Southern Methodist University leads as the No. 1 best university in Dallas-Fort Worth and the sixth best in Texas.

Niche's annual rankings compared over 4,000 colleges and universities based on their academics, value, student life, career preparation, and more. Schools receive letter grades across 14 metrics, which were expanded this year to include Student Wellness and Future Readiness.

Also new to this year's rankings, Niche implemented an "Institutional Success Score" that "places every college into one of 10 mission-based categories" and compared each school against "outcomes aligned with that mission," which included research institutions, social mobility-focused colleges, and religious institutions, among others.

Among the Best Christian Colleges, SMU ranks 5th in the U.S., and it is the 67th best private university in America.

SMU rival Texas Christian University in Fort Worth ranks three spots behind SMU as the eighth best Christian college and slightly lower on the national list of private universities, at No. 81.

In the overall ranking of the Best Colleges in America for 2027, SMU ranks 118th and TCU comes in at No. 142.

SMU also received the following top-100 rankings:

No. 58 – Best Greek Life Colleges
No. 62 – Best College Locations
No. 68 – Best College Campuses
No. 71 – Top Party Schools
No. 72 – Colleges With the Best Student Life
No. 80 – Colleges With the Best Professors
No. 99 – Best Colleges for Student Athletes

Also on the local front, University of Texas at Dallas ranked a respectable No. 13 in the Texas-wide list, and it ranked as the 219th best university in the U.S. It fared better in the nationwide list of the Best Big Colleges, appearing at No. 74.

Top education institutions across Texas
Four other Texas universities outside Dallas-Fort Worth excelled on Niche's list of the 100 Best Colleges in America.

Rice University in Houston topped the statewide list, ranked as the 10th best university in America, and is the 10th best private university in the U.S. for 2027.

The University of Texas at Austin ranked second statewide and 30th nationwide, and topped the list of Colleges With the Best Student Life. UT Austin also racked up top-10 acclaim in the separate lists of the Best College Locations (No. 4), Top Public Universities (No. 5), Best Big Colleges (No. 6), Best College Campuses (No. 10), and Best Colleges For Student Athletes (No. 10).

Texas A&M University in College Station and Trinity University in San Antonio round out the remaining Texas institutions that ranked among the top 100 overall. The Aggies ranked 52nd nationwide, and the Trinity Tigers ranked 65th overall.

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