Essex County Commute Time Map & Patterns

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Commuting in Essex County, Massachusetts: how long it takes, when people leave home and how they get to work. Ask Map AI about any address.

You 9/24/26, 1:28 PM

How much time do drivers in Essex County spend on the road daily?

Map AI 9/24/26, 1:28 PM

Commute Time Burden in Essex County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Essex County spend about 47 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 194 hours, about 8.1 full days, spent commuting. That is 9% less time on the road than the Massachusetts average of 25.6 minutes each way, a difference of 2.2 minutes.

Essex County holds about 11.5% of Massachusetts's population but accounts for roughly 10.5% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Essex County would save about 78 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,411 at the same national wage assumption used above.

Area	One-Way Commute	Daily Round-Trip	Yearly Time Spent	Estimated Yearly Cost	Local Road Traffic (VPD)
Essex County	23.3 min	46.7 min	194 hrs/yr	$6,028	2,726
Massachusetts	25.6 min	51.1 min	213 hrs/yr	$6,603	2,164
United States	22.4 min	44.8 min	187 hrs/yr	$5,790	1,355

The estimated yearly cost applies a single national rule of thumb (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics average hourly earnings), not a measurement of wages in this area - treat it as a rough estimate, not a paycheck figure. Local road traffic counts, vehicles per day on non-highway roads, come from proprietary Ticon and TrafficZoom data.

Commute Time Map: Massachusetts Counties

Fastest commutes among counties in Massachusetts

Nantucket County (12.8 min)
Dukes County (15.4 min)
Berkshire County (16.8 min)

Slowest commutes among counties in Massachusetts

Norfolk County (31.0 min)
Suffolk County (30.4 min)
Middlesex County (28.4 min)

Compare commute times among different counties

Essex County

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Average commute time

On average, it takes 23.3 minutes to get to work in Essex County. That's 4% longer than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM, followed by 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 16.4% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Essex County

Biking is unusually rare in Essex County: 4.5 times less than the Massachusetts average (0.2% vs 0.8%).

Commute Mode Trends in Essex County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Essex County get to work, as a share of all workers aged 16 and over, across 16 U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey (ACS) releases from 2009 to 2024. Each release is a 5-year estimate: the 2024 figures cover surveys taken from 2020 to 2024. Because neighboring releases share most of their survey years, the lines move gradually, and a sudden change such as the rise of remote work in 2020 spreads across several releases. Hover over or tap a line to highlight it, and use the legend to show or hide a mode. Driving starts hidden so the smaller modes stay readable.

Share of workers aged 16 and over, by ACS 5-year release year. Source: U.S. Census Bureau.

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Public Transportation	Walked	Other	Taxi	Bicycle	Motorcycle
2009	86.2%	4.2%	5.0%	3.1%	0.5%	0.5%	0.4%	0.1%
2010	86.4%	4.3%	4.7%	3.1%	0.6%	0.5%	0.4%	0.1%
2011	85.8%	4.5%	4.9%	3.3%	0.6%	0.4%	0.3%	0.1%
2012	85.5%	4.6%	4.8%	3.4%	0.8%	0.5%	0.3%	0.1%
2013	84.9%	4.7%	5.1%	3.5%	1.0%	0.4%	0.3%	0.1%
2014	83.7%	5.2%	5.5%	3.6%	1.3%	0.4%	0.2%	0.1%
2015	83.1%	5.5%	5.8%	3.3%	1.5%	0.5%	0.3%	0.1%
2016	82.9%	5.7%	5.7%	3.3%	1.5%	0.6%	0.2%	0.1%
2017	82.8%	5.7%	5.9%	3.3%	1.5%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%
2018	82.6%	5.8%	5.8%	3.3%	1.6%	0.5%	0.3%	0.1%
2019	83.4%	5.4%	5.7%	3.2%	1.4%	0.6%	0.2%	0.1%
2020	82.1%	7.6%	5.2%	3.1%	1.3%	0.5%	0.1%	0.0%
2021	80.0%	10.3%	4.5%	3.1%	1.4%	0.6%	0.1%	0.0%
2022	78.0%	12.7%	3.9%	2.9%	1.6%	0.6%	0.1%	0.0%
2023	76.4%	14.5%	3.7%	2.8%	1.7%	0.7%	0.2%	0.0%
2024	74.9%	16.4%	3.5%	2.6%	1.5%	0.8%	0.2%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2010 at 86.4%. Overall it fell from 86.2% in 2009 to 74.9% in 2024, down 11.3 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 5 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Essex County: its share of workers rose from 4.2% in 2009 to 16.4% in 2024, up 12.2 percentage points. Most of that increase, 11.0 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Public transit lost the most ground, falling from 5.0% to 3.5% of workers (down 1.5 percentage points).

Working from home overtook public transit to become the 2nd most common choice in the 2020 release and has stayed ahead since.

Commute Start Times in Essex County

Rush-Hour DodgersThe lowest share of rush-hour departures among Massachusetts's 14 counties: only 46.6% of commuters leave between 6:30 and 8:29 AM.

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Essex County?

The bars show when commuters in Essex County leave home for work, as a share of everyone who commutes (people who work from home are not counted), from the 2024 ACS 5-year estimates. The thin violet marks show Massachusetts for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM		4.2%
5:00-5:29 AM		4.7%
5:30-5:59 AM		4.4%
6:00-6:29 AM		8.9%
6:30-6:59 AM		9.5%
7:00-7:29 AM		14.2%
7:30-7:59 AM		10.8%
8:00-8:29 AM		12.1%
8:30-8:59 AM		6.7%
9:00-9:59 AM		7.4%
10:00-10:59 AM		3.3%
11:00-11:59 AM		1.4%
12:00-3:59 PM		7.6%
4:00-11:59 PM		4.8%

Essex County Massachusetts Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Essex County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 14.2% of commuters leave home, compared with 14.3% across Massachusetts. Early starts are more common than in Massachusetts: 13.3% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 11.1% there. The morning rush is more spread out than in Massachusetts: 46.6% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 49.0% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (24.5%) leave at 9 AM or later, which usually points to shift work, flexible hours or part-time jobs.

When people leave matters as much as how far they go. Rush-hour traffic shrinks how much ground a 20-minute trip covers, so a trade area drawn as a simple circle often takes in neighborhoods that customers or staff would never drive from and misses others that are an easy trip. A drive-time zone, also called an isochrone, outlines every place within a set number of minutes of an address, which makes it the more honest way to size a store's catchment, a hiring area or the commute from a new home.

See it for yourself on the interactive map: click any spot in Essex County, pick a 5, 10, 15 or 30-minute drive and see the local demographics of the people who live within that exact drive time.

Is Essex County Waking Up Earlier? Typical Departure Time, 2009-2024

Each line follows the typical (median) departure time: the moment by which half of commuters have already left home. Higher on the chart means a later start. Setting Essex County next to Massachusetts and the U.S. shows whether local mornings are drifting earlier or later than everyone else's. The figures span 16 ACS 5-year releases, so changes build up gradually rather than jumping from one year to the next.

Median time commuters leave home, by ACS 5-year release year. Source: U.S. Census Bureau.

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Essex County	Massachusetts	United States
2009	7:43 AM	7:47 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:43 AM	7:48 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:43 AM	7:48 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:44 AM	7:49 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:43 AM	7:49 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:42 AM	7:48 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:41 AM	7:48 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:40 AM	7:47 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:39 AM	7:47 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:38 AM	7:46 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:38 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:39 AM	7:46 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:40 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:40 AM	7:46 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:41 AM	7:47 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:41 AM	7:47 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Essex County were on the road by 7:41 AM, 1 minute earlier than in 2009 (7:43 AM). Across Massachusetts, the typical start barely moved over the same years. Commuters in Essex County now leave 4 minutes later than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM). Since the 2019 release, which covers the years just before the pandemic, the typical start in Essex County has moved 4 minutes later.

How does Essex County's commute time compare?

Metric	Essex County	Massachusetts	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	23.3 min	25.6 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	16.4%	18.6%	15.0%
Walked	2.6%	4.1%	2.4%
Public Transit	3.5%	6.5%	3.2%

The average commute time in Essex County is 23.3 minutes, shorter than the 25.6 minutes in Massachusetts.

3.5% commute by public transit, lower than the 6.5% in Massachusetts. 2.6% commute by walking, lower than the 4.1% in Massachusetts.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Essex County, MA Commute Compared With Nearby Counties

Essex County, MA is typical in size for this group, 810,585 residents against a local median of 729,949, so the measures below are close to a like for like comparison. Essex County, MA's one-way commute, at 23.3 min, runs 18% below the 28.4 min typical of the counties around it. That is the better end of the local range on this measure.

Work from home tells the same story from another angle: 16.4% against a local median of 19.9%, 18% below it. The counties themselves spread 5.2 min on one-way commute, so Essex County, MA sits at one end of an already wide local range rather than apart from it. Essex County, MA has the lowest one-way commute of the 6 areas compared here.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Essex County, MA	810,585	23.3 min #1/6	16.4% #5/6	7:41 AM #3/6
Suffolk County, MA	779,263	30.4 min	19.9%	8:03 AM
Rockingham County, NH	319,036	25.8 min	19.4%	7:32 AM
Middlesex County, MA	1,636,094	28.4 min	24.7%	7:57 AM
Norfolk County, MA	729,949	31.0 min	22.8%	7:51 AM
Plymouth County, MA	534,586	28.0 min	16.2%	7:31 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Essex County, Massachusetts.

What is the financial impact of commuting in Essex County, Massachusetts?

Commuters here spend an estimated 194 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $6,028 at a typical national wage. That's 9% less than the typical Massachusetts commuter spends.

What are the busiest morning travel hours in Essex County, Massachusetts?

Traffic peaks between 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM in Essex County, Massachusetts. Leaving before or after this window is the single easiest way to avoid the heaviest local congestion, though 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM also sees a secondary bump.

How do commute times compare across counties in Massachusetts?

Among counties in Massachusetts, the shortest average commutes are in Nantucket County (12.8 min), Dukes County (15.4 min), Berkshire County (16.8 min). The longest are in Norfolk County (31.0 min), Suffolk County (30.4 min), Middlesex County (28.4 min).