New Hampshire · Hillsborough County
Manchester Authority
Also known as: Manchester Metro Authority
Manchester is a upper-middle-income small city of 115,643.
Manchester is the largest city in New Hampshire, which is itself a state that takes some quiet pride in being larger than people expect and smaller than people assume. A city of 115,644 residents, according to Census ACS 5-Year data, it sits in Hillsborough County and functions as the commercial and demographic center of a state that otherwise distributes its population with considerable evenness across small towns and modest county seats.
Population and Demographics
The Census ACS 5-Year 2023 estimates put Manchester's total population at 115,643, with 49,546 total households, of which 26,730 are family households. The median age, per Census ACS demographics, is 38.0 years — a figure that places the city in a broadly working-age range, neither conspicuously young nor conspicuously retired. Children under 18 account for 18.0 percent of the population, or roughly 20,821 residents, which the derived Census ACS data characterizes as a family-oriented community.
The racial and ethnic composition, per Census ACS 5-Year 2023, includes 88,489 white residents, 6,146 Black residents, 5,265 Asian residents, and 15,522 residents identifying as Hispanic or Latino. These figures reflect a city that has, over several decades, absorbed successive waves of resettlement — a pattern common to mid-sized New England cities that once anchored textile manufacturing and have since found new economic identities.
Economy and Housing
Manchester's median household income, per entity facts drawn from federal sources, is $77,415. The calculated price-to-income ratio stands at 4.5, and rent consumes approximately 23.2 percent of median income, according to figures derived from Census median income and home value data. The affordability assessment characterizes this as "moderate" — a word that, in housing contexts, tends to mean "not catastrophic, but not comfortable either." The city is classified as not affordable by the same calculation.
Education
Four colleges operate within Manchester, per NCES IPEDS 2022 data matched by city and state. The most prominent by enrollment is Southern New Hampshire University, which the College Scorecard records as having 163,164 enrolled students — a number that reflects the university's substantial online enrollment alongside its physical campus. The College Scorecard lists SNHU's in-state and out-of-state tuition identically at $17,200, with an admission rate of 99.51 percent. Completion rate data is also tracked by the College Scorecard, though the precise figure is not reproduced here.
The city has 33 licensed childcare centers, per state facility data, ranging from ABC Day Nursery on Revere Avenue to Alpha-Bits Learning Center on Londonderry Turnpike, among others. The presence of 33 such facilities in a city of this size suggests a reasonably developed infrastructure for working families with young children, though the distribution across neighborhoods is not captured in the aggregate count.
Air Quality
The EPA AQI Annual Summary for 2024 recorded 366 days with an Air Quality Index reading in Manchester. Of those, 328 were classified as good days, and 38 as moderate. There were zero days classified as unhealthy for sensitive groups, unhealthy, very unhealthy, or hazardous. The maximum AQI recorded during the year was 97, and the median AQI is also documented in the EPA data. By the standards of American cities, this is a notably clean air record — the kind of result that tends to go unremarked precisely because nothing went wrong.
Climate
The nearest weather station to Manchester, MASSABESIC LAKE, sits approximately 3.0 miles from the city center, per NOAA ACIS data. The average temperature is 48.0 degrees Fahrenheit annually, and annual precipitation runs to 43.9 inches. New Hampshire winters being what they are, the annual average temperature is best understood as a mathematical compromise between summers that are genuinely pleasant and winters that are genuinely not.
Broadband Access
Per FCC Broadband Data Collection figures as of June 2025, Manchester has 56,230 total housing units with broadband coverage data on record. Coverage at the 25/3 Mbps threshold, the federal minimum definition of broadband, reaches 100 percent of units. Coverage at 100/20 Mbps also reaches 100 percent, as does coverage at 250/25 Mbps. At the 1,000/100 Mbps tier, coverage reaches 93.5 percent of units. These figures place Manchester among the better-served mid-sized cities in the region for residential internet infrastructure.
Civic and Community Organizations
The IRS Exempt Organizations BMF identifies 6 civic service organizations operating in Manchester, including the Boy Scouts of America, located at 1500 Bodwell Road, and The Granite YMCA at 670 North Commercial Street. The Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce is also registered in the IRS EO BMF, matched via canonical registry. Forty-eight churches are recorded in the IRS Exempt Organizations data, spanning a range that includes 1269 Cafe Ministries, Bethany Chapel, Biblical Missions International, Casa de Oracion Maranatha Inc., and Casa de Restauracion Jehova Rafa, among others — a list that reflects the city's linguistic and cultural diversity in fairly direct terms.
One animal shelter organization, Friends of the Manchester Animal Shelter, appears in the IRS EO BMF. One arts-adjacent organization, NH Charitable Gaming Operators Association Inc., is recorded under the arts organizations category in the same source, which is perhaps a broader definition of the arts than some would apply, but the IRS BMF categorizes as it categorizes.
Banking
The FDIC Institutions and Branches data lists multiple bank branches operating in Manchester. These include Bank of America, National Association, with a branch at 1000 S Willow Street (ZIP 03103), and Primary Bank, with a branch also in the city. The full branch list in the FDIC data covers additional institutions not enumerated here.
Municipal Governance
Manchester operates under a city charter with a municipal code maintained on Municode. The city's zoning and land development ordinances are organized under the legislative framework of the municipal code, which follows the general structure common to New England charter cities — council, ordinances and resolutions, and zoning and land development provisions as distinct chapters. The Manchester Municipal Code is accessible at https://library.municode.com/nh/manchester-city-new-hampshire.
Attractions
Fourteen attractions are recorded within the broader Manchester area, per the attractions data. These include Max's Country Golf, classified as a theme park type attraction, approximately 20.0 miles distant, and the Littlefield Library Museum, a museum-type attraction approximately 21.1 miles away. The full list of 14 extends beyond these two entries.
Further Reading
- U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates — https://data.census.gov
- National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data — https://nces.ed.gov/ccd/
- City of Manchester, Manchester Municipal Code (Municode) — https://library.municode.com/nh/manchester-city-new-hampshire