Why Duluth Is Considered The Loneliest City In Minnesota

Hiding in plain sight here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes is a Minnesota city that feels eerily lonely, even when it's full of people. Now dubbed the loneliest in the state, it’s a place where isolation apparently runs deeper than our long, cold winters.

According to the most recent 2022 data from the U.S. Census Bureau, 5,714,300 people now call the North Star State home. While a slight majority—about 53 percent—are married, nearly 48 percent of Minnesotans (just over 2.7 million people) are single, either having never married, or currently divorced or widowed.

Of course, being single doesn’t automatically mean being lonely. Some people thrive on solitude, while others say living alone or not being in a relationship can feel isolating. So, where in Minnesota are those lonely feelings most common? Which city ranks as the loneliest in the state?

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That's the question the number-crunchers over at 24/7 Wall Street attempted to answer. To find out which Minnesota city is the loneliest in the state, they did a survey that took into account several different factors:

To find the loneliest city in every state, 24/7 Wall St. used Census Bureau data, ranking 384 metro areas by the share of nonfamily households living alone out of all households. We added the share of people living alone as a percentage of the civilian, noninstitutionalized 16+ population.

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So what did they discover? Which city is the loneliest here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes? That honor, according to 24/7 Wall Street, goes to... Duluth! Yes, Minnesota's fifth-largest city is apparently also the loneliest in the entire state. Here's the data on why Duluth is so lonely:

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One-person households, 2022: 34.0% (42,905 households)
Adults living alone out of adult civilian pop: 18.1% (#23 out of 385 metros)
1-person household 65+ years: 14.9%, or 43.7% of one-person households
Monthly gross rent: $929 (#284 out of 385 metros)
Bachelor’s degree attainment rate: 30.0% (#208 out of 385 metros)
Median household income: $65,963 (#208 out of 385 metros)

Perhaps not-so-coincidently, while 24/7 Wall Street says Duluth is the loneliest city in Minnesota, it's also ranked as the 34th loneliest city in the entire COUNTRY too. Now, if you ARE single and don't want to be lonely, check out THIS MINNESOTA CITY, which was just named One of the Best Cities for Singles in the Entire Country!