Santa Rosa among the happiest cities in the US, according to WalletHub report

Santa Rosa is the 10th happiest city in the United States, according to a 2021 WalletHub report published Monday.

WalletHub ranked more than 180 cities nationwide based on more than 30 criteria related to emotional and physical well-being, income and employment, and community and environment to determine 2021’s Happiest Cities in America.

Each metric was graded on a 100-point scale, with 100 representing maximum happiness. A city’s weighted average across all metrics was used to calculate its overall score. The resulting score was used to order the cities.

Despite enduring two wildfires during the coronavirus pandemic and record unemployment in 2020, Santa Rosa is one of five Bay Area cities featured on the list. Fremont ranked first overall, while San Jose was fifth, San Francisco was 13th and Oakland was 38th.

Santa Rosa was ranked seventh for emotional and physical well-being, but ranked 32nd for income and employment and 33rd for community and environment.

The individual criteria that pushed Santa Rosa to the top of the list was its adequate sleep ranking (#9), income growth (#29), sports participation (#34) and hours worked per week (#35).

But Santa Rosa did not fare as well in other categories, including job security (#141), separation and divorce rate (#104) and hate crime incidents per capita (#104).

San Francisco, Oakland and Fremont are among the top cities for low depression rates, and Fremont has the lowest separation and divorce rate in the country. Santa Rosa did not rank in the top 5 for either categories.

Several other California cities were among the happiest in the U.S., including Irvine (#12), San Diego (#26) and Los Angeles (#99).

Go here to see the complete list of 2021’s Happiest Cities in America.