Appleton vs Sioux Falls
Metro-area medians — Appleton, WI Metro Area vs Sioux Falls, SD-MN Metro Area — not the cities proper.
Sioux Falls comes out ahead, winning 6 of the 7 clearly-decided measures.
Appleton and Sioux Falls are closely matched on both cost of living and household income. Adjusted for local prices, a typical paycheck stretches about as far in either.
For your salary & household
Enter your pay and household size to see what it's really worth here — the numbers update live and the link stays shareable.
On $75,000 for just you, Sioux Falls leaves you about $4,403/yr better off after tax and local prices.
Take-home estimates a single filer taking the standard deduction (2025 federal brackets, FICA, and state income tax) and isn't tax advice. “Real value” rebases take-home to average U.S. prices using the BEA cost-of-living index; the per-person figure uses the OECD square-root equivalence scale.
Choose Sioux Falls for
- + Livability (CityLedger)
- + Median rent
- + Unemployment
- + Bachelor's degree or higher
- + Average commute
- + Air quality (median AQI)
Appleton vs Sioux Falls — frequently asked
- Is Appleton cheaper than Sioux Falls?
- They are about even — the overall cost of living in the Appleton and Sioux Falls metros is within 3% of each other (BEA Regional Price Parities), so neither is meaningfully cheaper.
- Which has higher household income, Appleton or Sioux Falls?
- Household incomes are similar — $82,501 in the Appleton metro versus $82,509 in Sioux Falls (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS).
- Does a paycheck go further in Appleton or Sioux Falls?
- It is roughly a wash. After adjusting income for local prices, a typical paycheck is worth about the same in both metros ($89,268 versus $91,038).
- Which has cheaper rent, Appleton or Sioux Falls?
- Sioux Falls has cheaper rent — a median of $1,094/mo versus $1,164/mo (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS).