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VERDICT

Should I use County Health Rankings & Roadmaps?

Explore county and state health data - countyhealthrankings.org

Depends. Use it if you need free, well-documented US county health data for research, journalism, or a community health assessment. Do not build long-term pipelines on it — RWJF funding ends in 2026 and there is no 2026 annual data release.

Confidence

Medium. Based on ~20 public sources. No review-platform ratings exist; this is a free academic resource, not a vendor product.

Ratings

  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Feature depth
  • Support qualityNo support model evidence
  • Security posture

Pricing

$0

Free public resource

ModelNot disclosed
Monthly feesNot disclosed
HardwareNot disclosed
Free tierYes

Best for

  • Public health researchers
  • County health departments
  • Journalists citing county data
  • Community health needs assessments

Not for

  • Anyone needing data updates past December 2026 — the program sunsets
  • Non-US or sub-county geographies
  • Teams wanting a supported vendor product with SLAs
  • Real-time or individual-level health data needs

Gotchas - check before you buy

high

Sunset risk: funding ends 2026, resources run only through December 2026 — archive what you need now

high

No 2026 annual release; time-series and trend work hits a wall

medium

Some measures show no data for certain counties

low

No security page — fine for public data, but expect no enterprise assurances

Pros and cons

Pros

  • Completely free public resource — no licenses or tiers
  • Methods and data sources publicly documented
  • Widely cited in academic research and health assessments
  • Open-source code published on GitHub
  • Covers all US counties and states

Cons

  • RWJF funding ends 2026; resources guaranteed only through December 2026
  • No 2026 annual data release will be produced
  • No security page found
  • Peer-reviewed study questions ranking reliability

Sources & method

Analyzed 10/02/2026 - 11 sources - No security page found; public, no-login data site with minimal risk surface.

official x6review x3security x1news x1

Key stats

  • Value for money: 5/5

    Rating

  • $0

    Starting price

  • 11

    Sources

  • Analyzed

  • Value for money: 5/5. Free; no licenses or tiers
  • Ease of use: 4/5. Browse by county and state
  • Feature depth: 4/5. Deep county data, documented methodology
  • Support quality. No support model evidence
  • Security posture: 2/5. No security page found
  • Free Price No paid tiers found
  • Dec 2026 Program sunset RWJF funding ends; resources run through then
  • None 2026 annual release 34 measures updated, no full release
  • Yes Open source Public GitHub project

Pricing

Free public resource

$0

  • All county and state data
  • Reports, methods, and documentation

Security

No security page found; public, no-login data site with minimal risk surface.

What users say

Researchers, health departments, and Reddit data communities treat it as the default free source for US county health statistics.

“Dataset on Health outcomes for people in counties (or ...”
Reddit, r/datasets
“Is Your County Above or Below the National Life ...”
Reddit, r/MapPorn

Alternatives

Compare County Health Rankings & Roadmaps with each alternative.

Companies that use it

  • Carver County, MN (Health & Human Services)10
  • Lake County General Health District (OH)
  • Michigan Department of Health and Human Services
  • Memorial Health Southwest Oklahoma
Full analysis

Based on ~20 public sources. No review-platform ratings exist; this is a free academic resource, not a vendor product.

Free US county health data, widely cited — but the program sunsets after Dec 2026, so don't build long-term on it.

Methodology

Based on ~20 public sources. No review-platform ratings exist; this is a free academic resource, not a vendor product.

Sources

  1. County Health Rankings & Roadmapscountyhealthrankings.org
    official
  2. official
  3. official
  4. official
  5. official
  6. CHR&R Technical Documentation 2025countyhealthrankings.org
    official
  7. review
  8. review
  9. review
  10. news
  11. Security page crawl resultcountyhealthrankings.org
    security

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