Americans love to debate which state is the best place to live. They argue about weather, taxes, traffic, politics, sports teams, and cost of living. But a lesser-discussed question goes in a more pointed direction: which states do Americans actually hate? Travel and lifestyle research site SplashTravels recently published a 50-state hatred ranking study that attempted to answer exactly that. The study ranked all 50 states based on a combination of how much residents dislike their own state, how much population a state is losing, and how many other states across the country named it as the one they despise most. The results, detailed on the SplashTravels most hated states ranking, are equal parts fascinating and revealing.
To understand the findings, it helps to know how the 50-state hatred ranking study was built. A state’s overall ranking was determined by three factors: the percent of residents who say the state is the “worst possible state to live in,” the states with the biggest decrease in population, and the number of other states nationwide that say they hate that state the most. It’s worth noting that this study relies on survey opinions and self-reported data, not scientific polling with large probability samples. Think of it as a broad cultural temperature check rather than a rigorous academic census. Still, the patterns that emerge are hard to ignore.
When you layer all three factors together, something interesting happens. Some states that millions of Americans willingly move to every year end up scoring badly because other regions resent them deeply. Others land on the list almost entirely because their own residents have turned on them. A few defy expectations entirely. Before we get into the most disliked states in America, there’s one piece of the puzzle that sets the scene nicely: who are the least hated states?
The States Americans Actually Like
Using the third metric – the number of other states that say they hate a given state the most – not a single one of the other 49 states named Colorado as the state they disliked most. That’s a near-perfect score. Colorado sits at the bottom of the hatred ranking, meaning Americans from coast to coast are more or less at peace with the Centennial State. The scenery probably helps. The outdoor lifestyle and reputation for relative tolerance appear to insulate it from national resentment.
The least hated states tend to share a profile: they’re not too dominant in national culture, not too politically polarizing, and they don’t generate strong feelings either way. States like Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, and Vermont tend to sit quietly near the bottom of these rankings, meaning people rarely think about them strongly enough to claim a grudge. That calm obscurity turns out to be a genuine asset in a country that runs hot on regional opinions.
How the Study Was Built – and What It Can and Can’t Tell Us
It’s worth pausing to be clear about what this research is and isn’t. The study ranked all 50 states according to how “hated” they are by other Americans, including both residents and non-residents of each individual state. That breadth is useful – it captures both internal frustration and external grudges. But it also means that large, high-profile states face a kind of structural disadvantage. The more famous and influential a state is, the more likely people are to have strong opinions about it – and in a country as divided as this one, strong opinions often skew negative.
Population decline data lends the study some objectivity. When people leave a state in measurable numbers, that’s a hard signal. Survey opinions about what’s “worst” are subjective, but feet-on-the-ground migration tells a different story. According to migration data compiled by moveBuddha, California remains the number one state people are leaving in 2026, driven by high housing costs, taxes, and overall cost of living. That kind of data grounds the survey findings in real economic behavior.
Which State Is the Most Disliked in America?
Ask which state is the most disliked in America, and many people might guess California or New York. Both appear in the top 10, and for understandable reasons. But the actual top spot belongs to Illinois. Most of the Illinois “hate” comes from within the state itself, and 25% of Illinois residents calling it the worst place to live is a striking number. A quarter of the state’s own people think they’re living in the worst state in the country. That’s a remarkable level of internal dissatisfaction for a state that, by many objective measures, is not struggling in the same ways as true economic basket cases.
The contradiction runs deeper when you look at what the data says about Illinois on paper. A separate comprehensive “best states to live in” ranking found Illinois, New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts all in the top 20. Massachusetts ranked number one on that list, New Jersey came in at number three, New York placed ninth, and Illinois – the state where a quarter of residents think it’s the worst – ranked 16th best in the entire country. So residents of some of America’s objectively most well-functioning states are among the most likely to say they hate where they live. That’s a puzzle worth sitting with.
What Is the Least Liked State in the US? California’s Outsider Problem
While Illinois dominates the hatred ranking from within, California has a different kind of problem. California has the most states hating on it in the country. Nine separate states named California as the state they dislike most. That level of external resentment is unmatched across the entire 50-state map. No other state comes close to generating that much cross-border contempt.
It’s a striking finding given California’s cultural and economic weight. The state is home to Hollywood, Silicon Valley, some of the country’s best universities, and a GDP that would rank among the top 10 countries in the world. But scale and influence breed resentment. California’s style, its politics, its housing prices, and the general cultural assertiveness of Los Angeles and San Francisco grate on people in other parts of the country in ways that quieter states simply don’t. According to January 2026 data from the U.S. Census Bureau, California was one of only five states that actually lost population between July 2024 and July 2025. A state that bleeds both residents and goodwill at the same time is in a specific kind of trouble.
New York, New Jersey, and the Northeast Grudge Matches
Only two states in the top 10 are more disliked by their own residents than New York – and the state that “hates” New York the most is Massachusetts, because some rivalries never go away. Yankees versus Red Sox, anyone? It’s almost amusing that a decades-old baseball rivalry still shows up in state-level opinion data. But it speaks to something real about how regional identity and competitive resentment harden over generations.
New Jersey lands in the top 10 as well. Five other states calling New Jersey the worst surprised researchers. The state suffers from a stereotype that took root with reality television and never quite recovered. From a practical standpoint, New Jersey ranks low in affordability for retirees, requiring around $964,000 in savings – and the state carries the highest property tax rate in the nation at 2.23%, along with a steep 10.75% income tax rate. Those aren’t just perceptions. Those are real numbers that push people out. And yet, like Illinois, New Jersey consistently scores well on objective quality-of-life metrics. The gap between data and feeling is the story.
Connecticut makes the top 10 in a particularly interesting way. None of the other 49 states named Connecticut as the state they hated most – but it still found itself in the top 10, largely because 17% of Connecticut residents called it the “worst possible state to live in.” That means Connecticut’s ranking is almost entirely self-inflicted. It’s a state whose own residents have soured on it more than anyone else has. Migration analysts at moveBuddha noted in early 2026 that states like Connecticut face structural challenges: high property taxes, exorbitant real estate prices, and corporate headquarters increasingly leaving the state and taking jobs with them.
Which States Do Americans Dislike the Most – and Why?
The full top 10 most hated states paints a picture dominated by high-cost, high-profile, often politically charged places. Illinois tops the list with internal dissatisfaction, followed closely by California with its record external resentment. New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Connecticut round out the Northeast and Great Lakes presence. Michigan, Kentucky, Mississippi, and West Virginia represent states with different kinds of struggles – population decline, economic hardship, and the slow drain of opportunity that turns even loyal residents away.
Michigan has the second-lowest population decline percentage among the top 10 most hated states, and 9% of its residents named it the worst state. That puts Michigan in an interesting middle ground – not losing people as fast as the others, but still generating enough internal disappointment to crack the list. The recent Census data tells a more hopeful story for Michigan, though. The U.S. Census Bureau noted that Michigan recorded a net domestic migration of 1,796 in 2025, compared to a loss of 28,290 in 2021 – a notable turnaround suggesting the state may be stabilizing.
Kentucky’s placement tells a story of neighboring state rivalries. When it comes to Kentucky, Tennessee and Indiana are the two states that said they hate it the most, and about 6% of people within Kentucky itself also agree with that assessment. State rivalries in the South and Midwest run deep, shaped by college football, economic competition, and cultural friction that outsiders often underestimate. What you think about a neighboring state often says as much about your own regional identity as it does about theirs.
The study doesn’t provide detailed stats for Mississippi specifically, but the state ranked as the sixth-worst state to live in on a comprehensive 2024 ranking. That broader context helps explain why it lands in the top 10 most disliked states. Mississippi consistently struggles with poverty rates, healthcare access, and economic opportunity in ways that create genuine discontent among residents – not just perception-driven resentment.
The Paradox of “Hated” States That Rank Well on Paper
Perhaps the most striking insight from this entire 50-state study is the disconnect between perception and data. Massachusetts is ranked the number one state to live in by WalletHub’s 2024 Best States ranking, scoring first for healthcare and education, with 97% of residents covered by health insurance and the lowest premature death rate in the country. It also appears among the most disliked states. New Jersey, ranked third best in the same study, is simultaneously one of the most resented states in America.
What this tells us is that “hating” a state is rarely about objective living conditions. It’s about identity, politics, cost, and the feeling of being squeezed. Even in Massachusetts – ranked the best place to live – one in five residents said they see themselves leaving the state within five years, with those struggling to afford housing and transportation being even more likely to consider moving. Affordability is the fault line running beneath almost all of these rankings. A state can be excellent in measurable ways and still feel unlivable if you can’t afford a home.
Migration data from North American Van Lines confirms this pattern: California, New Jersey, and Illinois are considered high-cost states, and higher cost of living is likely the main reason for the uptick in outbound migration from all three. The “hatred” for these places is often frustration by proxy – people blaming the state itself for economic conditions that are really the product of housing markets, policy choices, and global economic forces.
What the Least Popular States Get Wrong – and Sometimes Right
The states that dominate the most hated rankings aren’t necessarily the worst places to live by data, but they do share something: they’ve failed to manage the gap between aspiration and reality. People move to New York or California with enormous expectations. When the cost of a one-bedroom apartment consumes half a paycheck, the disappointment lands hard. That gap between what these places promise and what they deliver to ordinary people generates the bitterness that shows up in surveys like this one.
At the same time, there’s a strong argument that Americans have a tendency to punch at states that represent something they’re ambivalent about – urbanity, density, liberal politics, or old money. According to Newsweek’s analysis of 2026 Census and migration data, Americans continue to move toward lower-cost, lower-tax states, with the South and parts of the Mountain West as primary beneficiaries. That migration pattern both reflects and reinforces the resentment. As people leave, those who stay are often the most economically trapped – and the most likely to tell a survey their state is the worst.
What the Rankings Actually Tell Us About Ourselves
Any honest read of this 50-state hatred ranking study has to acknowledge what it really is: a map of American frustration. The states at the top of this list are, by and large, places with enormous populations, enormous influence, and enormous costs. They’re states that generate strong feelings because they matter – to the culture, to the economy, to national politics. You don’t passionately hate something you don’t care about.
The most disliked states in America aren’t failing states in any simple sense. They’re complicated places where aspiration collides with economic reality, where cultural identity creates tribal friction, and where the gap between the best and worst versions of a place is wide enough to generate real resentment. According to the Census Bureau’s Vintage 2025 estimates, the fastest-growing states in 2025 were South Carolina at 1.5%, Idaho at 1.4%, North Carolina at 1.3%, and Texas at 1.2% – none of which appear in the most hated top 10. The places gaining people are, by definition, the places generating hope rather than frustration.
The SplashTravels research is a snapshot of a country in real tension with itself. Americans are mobile, opinionated, and deeply shaped by where they’re from and where they feel stuck. That a quarter of Illinois residents think they live in the worst state in the country says something important: not about Illinois specifically, but about the way people relate to place when economic anxiety is high and options feel limited. The hatred is real. But so is the complexity underneath it.
This article was created with the assistance of AI tools and reviewed by a human editor.