Massachusetts ranked in the top 10 in U.S. News & World Report’s rankings of best states in the country, coming in at No. 9. It also ranks among the top five states in the health care, education, economy, crime and corrections and natural environment categories.

States were ranked in 71 metrics across eight main categories: health care, education, economies, infrastructure and opportunities; as well as fiscal stability, crime and corrections; and the state’s natural environment. Health care and education weighted most heavily in the survey, according to the report. 

Massachusetts also ranked second in health care, second in education, fifth for economy, 42nd for infrastructure, 36th for opportunity, 43rd for fiscal stability, fourth for crime and corrections, and fourth for natural environment. 

In 2019 and in 2018, Massachusetts ranked one notch higher at No. 8. In 2017 Massachusetts was ranked the No. 1 state in the country in the annual report. There were no rankings in 2020 due to COVID.