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America’s Most Popular City Names
If your hometown is called Columbus or Springfield—like the fictional city in The Simpsons—it has one of the most common city names in America. Researchers dug through data from the U.S. Census Bureau to compare the names of all the incorporated cities that have at least 20,000 residents.
This chart shows the top names across the country. Why might the names be so popular?
| CITY NAME | OCCURENCES | STATES |
| Columbus | 5 | Georgia, Indiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, Ohio |
| Springfield | 5 | Illinois, Massachusetts, Missouri, Ohio, Oregon |
| Albany | 4 | California, Georgia, New York, Oregon |
| Auburn | 4 | Alabama, Maine, New York, Washington |
| Greenville | 4 | Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas |
| Lafayette | 4 | California, Colorado, Indiana, Louisiana |
| Lakewood | 4 | California, Colorado, Ohio, Washington |
| Lancaster | 4 | California, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas |
| Monroe | 4 | Louisiana, Michigan, North Carolina, Washington |
| Newark | 4 | California, Delaware, New Jersey, Ohio |
| Richmond | 4 | California, Indiana, Kentucky, Virginia |
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2023
