Raleigh has claimed the title of best big city in America for Gen Z, unseating Minneapolis and Atlanta, which had traded the top spot for the past four years. A new study from CommercialCafe gave Raleigh the No. 1 ranking after evaluating cities with populations over 400,000 across nine weighted metrics covering demographics, affordability, employment, education, and lifestyle. Raleigh edged out Minneapolis, Atlanta, and Tucson for the crown, marking the first time since 2022 that a city other than Minneapolis or Atlanta has topped the list.
The rise didn’t happen overnight. As reported by CBS17, Raleigh scored 65.9 points in the latest CommercialCafe evaluation and ranked first in the South, after placing fifth nationally in the firm’s Gen Z livability reports in both 2023 and 2025. That steady climb reflects years of momentum rather than a sudden spike, according to Becker’s Hospital Review, which tracked Raleigh’s 2025 standing when the city posted a 30.3% share of entry-level jobs suited to recent graduates and an 8.8% adult Gen Z population share.
Gen Z now makes up 9.7% of Raleigh’s roughly 500,000 residents, per the study, giving the city the third-highest share of Gen Z residents among those evaluated. Nearly half of that cohort, 46.4%, remains enrolled in school, giving Raleigh the third-highest Gen Z school enrollment rate in the South. Fayetteville Street, in the heart of downtown Raleigh, has become a visible symbol of that youthful density as the city’s population continues to skew younger.
Jobs and Schools Feed a Self-Sustaining Pipeline
Raleigh landed among the top five cities in the study for entry-level job share, and the region ranked second in the South for the amount of jobs available to recent graduates. The city also posted the fifth-highest percentage of jobs suited to recent graduates nationally, at 31.6%, the study notes. That job pipeline is fed directly by the region’s massive student population: North Carolina State University recorded a total headcount of 40,503 students for the fall 2025 semester, including 27,885 undergraduates, according to NC State University…