Walkability, affordablilty of hotel rooms, ease-of-access, safety and exciting tourism options are city assets that make for good convention. Each year, we measure these things using the latest statistics. For 2020, the ratings for weather changed to favor milder climates and more cities from California appear than ever before including our #1 pick, San Diego. 

A dozen “second-tier” and a few smaller cities with more attractive hotel rates made the list for the first time. Pittsburgh, Boise and Tampa are three examples. All have affordable room rates and above average scores in most other areas. Pittsburgh excelled in the tourism ranking factor which now also considers a city’s parks. A few other cities in our top 25 with an abundance of city parks are St Paul, Madison, Wisconsin and Portland, Oregon. 


    *SEE: Explanation of the criteria used for the ranking of the best convention cities in 2020

    Note: Only cities with convention centers are eligible for the annual top 25 list.  Click here to see the ranking of all 166 USA cities used in the report.

    Sources: https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/nav/jsf/pages/searchresults.xhtml
    https://censtats.census.gov/cbpnaic/cbpnaic.shtml
    https://www.bestplaces.net
    https://www.flightsfrom.com/
    https://www.faa.gov/airports/planning_capacity/passenger_allcargo_stats/passenger/media/cy15-cargo-airports.pdf
    https://www.gsa.gov/portal/content/104877
    https://www.walkscore.com/
    https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access/land-based-station-data/land-based-datasets/climate-normals/1981-2010-normals-data https://pennenvironment.org/sites/environment/files/reports/Trouble%20in%20the%20Air%20vPA.pdf