The Best Place To Live On National Coffee Day

Deals are all around with both National Coffee Day and International Coffee Day upon us, but some places in the US give you a better opportunity than others to score a celebratory cup of joe. Recent data from Apartment Guide shows the best cities for coffee lovers to live in.

To determine the list, Apartment Guide considered every city in the United States with at least one coffee shop or coffee-related establishment and with more than 100,000 residents. From there, the study determined the ratio of coffee spots per 100,000 residents and ranked them. The same ratio and ranking was performed for each city's coffee spots per square mile. Finally, both ratios were weighted equally and given a score from 1 to 100 to determine the top cities for coffee lovers.

Even though the top overall rankings take into account both coffee shops per 100,000 people and coffee shops per square mile, Apartment Guide also provided separate lists for each of those categories. I firmly believe that the simple pleasure of a decent cup of coffee should be accessible to all, but thinking about the number of cafes per person seems less helpful than knowing you have options within a half-mile radius of where you live and/or work.

Nonetheless, if both aspects are important to you, these are the top 10 cities overall (from best to worst):

1. San Francisco, California
2. Berkley, California
3. Miami, Florida
4. Seattle, Washington
5. Portland, Oregon
6. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
7. Orlando, Florida
8. Bellingham, Washington
9. Everett, Washington
10. Asheville, North Carolina

If you're someone who lives in a place where a Dunkin' or a Starbucks seems to sit on almost every corner, then your most relevant top 10 list is the one below. This is based solely on the number of coffee shops or establishments per square mile, not per capita. Sadly, The Takeout's hometown of Chicago did not rank among the top 10, but we did rank No. 4 in total number of coffee shops overall, with 1,784.

1. San Francisco, California
2. Berkley, California
3. Miami, California
4. Seattle, Washington
5. Jersey City, New Jersey
6. Washington, DC
7. Boston, Massachusetts
8. New York, New York
9. Westminster, California
10. San Mateo, california

In case it isn't obvious from the lists above, much of these rankings can be chalked up to population density. Chicago has a lot of coffee shops, but it also encompasses a comparably vast geographic area, lowering the likelihood of ranking among the most shops per square mile.

These figures can indicate a lot more than coffee sales. After all, coffee shops do more than satisfy caffeine cravings: Whether it's a local shop or a chain, these places provide residents the "third place" in which to gather, study, work, post to bulletin boards, take a quick mental break—trust me I could go on. Although I don't know anyone who actually uses this sociological lingo, Starbucks often describes itself as the Third Place, somewhere besides home and work meant for relaxation and conversation. I don't ever think I'll consider Starbucks my home away from home, but many people would, and the sentiment could be applied to pretty much any local coffee shop.

So before you pack up your mugs and creamers, consider what your local java hangout has to offer. Sure, it might be a bit more of a walk than if you went through the drive-thru at a Dunkin', but frequenting the cafes in your neighborhood might help attract more options in the future.