On the recently released list of the “Best Places to Live in the U.S.” from U.S. News and World Report, Mobile ranked 115 out of 150 cities that the publication studied. It’s a jump from last year, when Mobile ranked 130 on the list.

“Mobile has been reflected positively and negatively on a number of lists,” city spokesperson Jason Johnson said. “The trouble with so many of these listicles is that they’re often based on random points of data, have inconsistent methodologies and don’t include adequate sample sizes. There is so much about a community that you can’t measure through data.”

Mobile is the lowest ranked of all the major metropolitan areas in Alabama: Birmingham and Montgomery were listed at 80 and 94 on the list, respectively. Huntsville, the largest city in Alabama, had been ranked the #1 best place to live on the list in 2022. This year, it fell one spot, to #2.

U.S. News and World Report ranks cities using four criteria:

· “desirability,” which includes “net migration;”