What is Visalia's Life Score?

Visalia scores 43.2/100 (grade C), rank #303 of 387. Signature composite at the 22nd percentile; stamps LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · cost DEAR · wages HIGH.

What pulls Visalia up or down?

Strongest: schools (100/100). Weakest: childcare (2/100). Profile mark SCHOOL-STRONG; dimension gap 97.

How current is this data?

Federal releases current as of August 2026 (BEA, BLS, HUD, FBI, NCES, DOL, EPA). Cadence varies by series; see methodology.

Metro Life Score

Visalia, CA

Bottom-quartile composite Life Score — grade C, 22nd percentile of the national corpus.

Compiled by PlainCompare

43.2
Life Score / 100: C
Grade (curved): #303
of 387 metros: 22%
composite percentile

View your shortlist

Data updated August 2026

Verify: BEA · BLS · HUD · FBI · NCES · EPA · Census · Report a data issue · Data changelog

The verdict

Visalia is bottom-quartile composite Life Score — #303 of 387 (43.2/100, grade C, 22nd percentile). Carried by schools at 100/100; held back most by childcare at 2/100.

22nd
composite percentile: #303
of 387 peers: 24th
cost dimension percentile: 71st
wages dimension percentile

Life Score shape · LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · signature composite

Visalia: bottom-third composite — where the drag concentrates

Visalia sits in the bottom third of the metro corpus on composite (#303 of 387, 43.2/100, 22nd percentile). Stamps LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG; Childcare at 2/100 is the main drag; Schools (100/100) keeps the floor. Cost/wage marks DEAR/HIGH. According to PlainCompare's federal Life Score corpus ranking, Visalia, CA ranks #303 of 387 metros by composite Life Score (highest = #1) and #296 of 387 by cost-of-living dimension score (highest = #1). Methodology.

BEA RPP 99.8 (rent-RPP 84.1). BLS median salary $68,839, 164,460 jobs (Farmworkers and Laborers, Crop, Nursery, and Greenhouse, Home Health and Personal Care Aides, Fast Food and Counter Workers). HUD 2BR FMR $1,474/mo (studio $1,116).

FBI UCR (CA): 477 violent, 1986 property/100K. NCES: 20.8:1 ratio, 12.8% charter. DOL infant childcare $17,920/yr. EPA: 116 Superfund sites (CA).

Where Visalia sits among all US metros

Composite Life Score vs the national field

43 22nd percentile higher than 22% of 387 US metros

Each bar is a band; taller bars hold more US metros. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.

Source PlainCompare composite of BEA, BLS, HUD, FBI, NCES, DOL, EPA data · August 2026

How the 43.2 is built

Visalia's Life Score, decomposed

Cost of Living 4.7 (11%) Wages 14.3 (33%) Rent 4.9 (11%) Safety 1.2 (3%) Schools 10.0 (23%) Childcare 0.2 (1%) Environment 8.0 (18%)

Dimension detail

How Visalia scores, dimension by dimension

Score Breakdown

Dimension Scores

Cost of Living 24/100 (20%) Below average

Wages 72/100 (20%) Average

Rent 32/100 (15%) Average

Safety 8/100 (15%) Bottom 10%

Schools 100/100 (10%) Top 10%

Childcare 2/100 (10%) Bottom 10%

Environment 80/100 (10%) Above average

Key Data Points

99.8

Cost Index (RPP)

$68,839

Avg Median Salary

$1,474

2BR Fair Market Rent

477

Violent Crime/100K (CA)

20.8:1

Student-Teacher Ratio

$17,920

Infant Childcare/yr (CA)

116

Superfund Sites (CA)

164,460

Total Employment

Geography used: crime, schools, childcare, and environment cards above are CA state-level when metro-specific feeds are unavailable, see the scope key at the top of this page.

Compare Visalia With...

Visalia vs El Centro Compare → Visalia vs Bakersfield Compare → Visalia vs Merced Compare → Visalia vs Paducah Compare → Visalia vs Pocatello Compare → Visalia vs Wildwood Compare →

Ranking Context

Visalia outranks 22% of U.S. metros.

Rank	Metro	Score	Grade
#300	Little Rock-North Little Rock-Conway, AR	43.5	C
#301	Kenosha, WI	43.5	C
#302	Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA	43.6	C
#303	Visalia, CA	43.2	C
#304	Albuquerque, NM	43.2	C
#305	Fresno, CA	43.2	C
#306	Waterbury-Shelton, CT	43.0	C

Quality vs. Affordability

Visalia, CA's quality rank (bottom 22% lowest-quality) and affordability rank (bottom 24% least affordable) sit close together -- an unusually proportionate metro where overall quality and cost-of-living move together.

Visalia, CA (highlighted) among its 12 nearest composite-Life-Score peers, out of 387 tracked metros nationally. Crosshairs mark this peer neighborhood's own median composite score and cost-of-living score. Cost-of-living score is already inverted so higher = more affordable.

CA Metro Scores

El Centro, CA B- 50.3 Bakersfield-Delano, CA C+ 45.7 Merced, CA C 44.0 Fresno, CA C 43.2 Redding, CA C- 42.5 Hanford-Corcoran, CA C- 42.0

Read with Visalia

Nearest composite peers and cost poles for Visalia (LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · DEAR/HIGH), replacing the fixed Explore/Guides strip.

Albuquerque, NM

ABS(composite) peer at 43.2 (Δ 0.0 vs this metro); higher Life Score · grade C vs this page's LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · DEAR/HIGH.

Fresno, CA

ABS(composite) peer at 43.2 (Δ 0.0 vs this metro); higher Life Score · grade C vs this page's LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · DEAR/HIGH.

Waterbury-Shelton, CT

ABS(composite) peer at 43.0 (Δ 0.2 vs this metro); lower Life Score · grade C vs this page's LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · DEAR/HIGH.

Kenosha, WI

ABS(composite) peer at 43.5 (Δ 0.3 vs this metro); higher Life Score · grade C vs this page's LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · DEAR/HIGH.

Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton, PA-NJ (cost pole)

ABS(cost_score) orthogonal peer at 23/100 (Δ 0); cost stamp DEAR vs this metro's DEAR.

Palm Bay-Melbourne-Titusville, FL (cost pole)

ABS(cost_score) orthogonal peer at 23/100 (Δ 1); cost stamp DEAR vs this metro's DEAR.

Visalia, CA relocation guide

Stamp-branched guide for LOWER · SCHOOL-STRONG · DEAR/HIGH - how to read federal Life Score inputs before a move.

Using Visalia's bottom-third Life Score

Visalia scores 43.2/100 overall, but Schools (99.7) and Childcare (2.4) sit 97.4 points apart, so decide which of the two matters more to you before leaning on the total.

Schools is the strongest of Visalia's seven dimensions (weighted 10% in the composite); if it is your priority, this is where the metro earns its rank. See all seven dimensions
Childcare is the weakest (weighted 10% in the composite); if it is a dealbreaker, weigh it before the ranking does. Rank metros on the composite
El Centro is the nearest comparison this page can offer; put the two side by side on the same seven dimensions. Compare with El Centro

A low composite is a weighted blend; individual dimensions can still be strong.

Data from BEA, HUD, FBI UCR, BLS OES, NCES, DOL, and EPA. Not affiliated with the U.S. Government.

Data sourced from official public datasets. See our methodology for details. Visalia Life Score 43.2/100 · signature composite · retrieved and formatted by PlainCompare

Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.

All federal data sources used on this page

U.S. Census Bureau ACS - multi-dimension demographic + housing + income aggregates for cross-area comparison. census.gov/programs-surveys/acs
BEA Regional Economic Accounts - GDP, personal income, employment by state and metro. bea.gov/data/regional
BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) - wage estimates for comparable-area indexing. bls.gov/oes
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) - crime statistics for safety-score component. fbi.gov/ucr
NCES Common Core of Data - public-school quality indicators by area. nces.ed.gov/ccd
EPA AirNow + Air Quality System (AQS) - air-quality measurements by area. epa.gov/outdoor-air-quality-data
HUD Fair Market Rents (FMR) - county and metro housing-cost indicators. huduser.gov/datasets/fmr