--- title: Most Polluted Cities In US: New American Lung Association Air Report description: Spoiler alert: the top 5 are in California canonical: https://time.com/82505/most-polluted-cities-in-america/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-04-30T15:01:45.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:09:15.215Z og:title: These Are the 10 Most Polluted Cities In the U.S. og:description: Spoiler alert: the top 5 are in California og:url: https://time.com/82505/most-polluted-cities-in-america/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcc385e751e3ad0ae/69868d25adae441786542d71/129368533.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Hollywood Hills with Smog and Fog og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: These Are the 10 Most Polluted Cities In the U.S. twitter:description: Spoiler alert: the top 5 are in California twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcc385e751e3ad0ae/69868d25adae441786542d71/129368533.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # These Are the 10 Most Polluted Cities In the U.S. by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Apr 30, 2014 3:01 PM UTC  A view of the Hollywood Hills with smog and fog A view of the Hollywood Hills with smog and fogUniversal / Getty Images by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Apr 30, 2014 3:01 PM UTC The American Lung Association has released its annual [State of the Air report](http://www.stateoftheair.org/2014/assets/ALA-SOTA-2014-Full.pdf), which details the levels of air quality in cities by examining ozone and particle pollution across the nation. As you might have guessed, things aren’t _great._ Nearly half of Americans live in areas with dangerous levels of air pollution. And in California, nearly 3 out of 4 residents live in polluted cities. Still, the report says, thanks to the Clean Air Act the overall air quality is much better than it was a decade ago. As of this year, here are the top 10 cities with the worst ozone pollution: 1. Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA 2. Visalia-Porterville-Hanford, CA 3. Bakersfield, CA 4. Fresno-Madera, CA 5. Sacramento-Roseville, CA 6. Houston-The Woodlands, TX 7. Modesto-Merced, CA 8. Dallas-Fort Worth, TX-OK 9. Washington-Baltimore-Arlington, DC-MD-VA-WV-PA 10. Las Vegas-Henderson, NV-AZ There were four cities, however, that stood out as the cleanest. That means they had no days in the unhealthy level for ozone or short-term particle pollution and were on the list of the cleanest cities for year-round particle pollution. Those cities were Bangor, ME, Bismarck, ND, Cape Coral-Fort Myers, FL, and Salinas, CA. So if you want to breathe easy, now you know where you should (and probably shouldn’t) move. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/82505/most-polluted-cities-in-america/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/82505/most-polluted-cities-in-america/"},"headline":"These Are the 10 Most Polluted Cities In the U.S.","datePublished":"2014-04-30T15:01:45.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:09:15.215Z","description":"Spoiler alert: the top 5 are in California","url":"https://time.com/82505/most-polluted-cities-in-america/","keywords":["Newsfeed","California","Pollution","U.S.","los angeles","Air"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcc385e751e3ad0ae/69868d25adae441786542d71/129368533.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcc385e751e3ad0ae/69868d25adae441786542d71/129368533.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Hollywood Hills with Smog and Fog","caption":"Hollywood Hills with Smog and Fog","creditText":"Universal / Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/82505/most-polluted-cities-in-america/","name":"These Are the 10 Most Polluted Cities In the U.S."}}]}] ```