America's Fastest Growing Cities

With a net addition of nearly 56,000 new residents over the last eight years, Naples is the sixth fastest growing metro area in Florida and the 20th fastest growing nationwide. The bulk of the metro area’s 17.3% population growth came through net migration, as over 50,000 more people moved to the metro area than left in the last eight years.

As the U.S. population ages, metro areas like Naples are popular destinations for retired Americans. In Naples, 30.2% of the population are 65 or older, more than double the 14.9% share of the total U.S. population.

Due mostly to new residents moving in, there are nearly 105,000 more people living in Florida’s Lakeland-Winter Haven metro area now than there were in 2010. The metro area has much in common with other fast growing metro areas, including a warm climate, strong job growth, and relatively safe streets. The violent crime rate in the Lakeland metro area is just 285 incidents per 100,000 residents, well below the national violent crime rate 383 incidents per 100,000.

Along with Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston is one of only two metro areas now home to over a million more people than compared to 2010. Largely due to the population growth, the Houston metro area is now the fifth most populous metro area in the country, up from the sixth most populous in 2010.

The metro area’s staggering 17.7% population growth since 2010 is due primarily to new residents moving in from other parts of the country and the world, but also in no small part to a births out numbering deaths.

Arkansas is not an especially fast growing state in terms of population, and Fayetteville is the only metro area in the state to rank among the fastest growing cities in the country. Over the last eight years, the metro area’s population grew by 18.0%, well above both the 5.8% national population growth and the 3.1% statewide population growth. Population growth in the Fayetteville metro area is attributable to both births outnumbering deaths and more people moving in than moving out.

Nearly 90,000 more people moved to the Charleston metro area than left between 2010 and 2018. Including the natural population change — number of births less the number of deaths — the metro area’s population grew by 18.0% over the last eight years, the second largest growth of any South Carolina metro area and the 16th largest nationwide.

Americans often move for job or career opportunities, and the number of jobs in the Charleston metro area increased by 23.1% in the last eight years, nearly double the U.S. rate. Currently, just 2.8% of the metro area’s labor force is unemployed, compared to a 3.9% U.S. unemployment rate.