Smith County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Smith County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Smith County spend about 54 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 223 hours, about 9.3 full days, spent commuting. That is 24% more time on the road than the Mississippi average of 21.5 minutes each way, a difference of 5.2 minutes.

Smith County holds about 0.5% of Mississippi's population but accounts for roughly 0.6% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Smith County would save about 89 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,765 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)
Smith County	26.8 min	53.5 min	223 hrs/yr	$6,913	313
Mississippi	21.5 min	43.0 min	179 hrs/yr	$5,558	914
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: Mississippi Counties

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 26.8 minutes to get to work in Smith County. That's 19% longer than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM, followed by 06:30 AM – 06:59 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 3.8% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Smith County

• Car: 94.4%
• Worked at Home: 3.8%
• Other: 1.3%
• Walked: 0.5%
• Motorcycle: < 0.1% unusually low
• Public Transportation: < 0.1% unusually low
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low
• Bicycle: < 0.1% unusually low

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Smith County, versus 0.1% in Mississippi.

Public transit is essentially absent in Smith County, versus 0.3% in Mississippi.

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Smith County, versus 0.1% in Mississippi.

Biking is essentially absent in Smith County, versus 0.1% in Mississippi.

Few people walk or bike to work in Smith County: just 0.5%, 3.1 times below the Mississippi average of 1.4%.

Commute Mode Trends in Smith County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Smith 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.

• Car
• Worked at Home
• Other
• Walked
• Public Transportation
• Taxi
• Motorcycle
• Bicycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Other	Walked	Public Transportation	Taxi	Motorcycle	Bicycle
2009	90.4%	4.1%	3.3%	1.8%	0.3%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2010	91.3%	3.7%	3.1%	1.5%	0.3%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2011	92.0%	3.8%	2.9%	0.9%	0.4%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2012	94.6%	2.1%	2.0%	0.6%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2013	95.5%	1.6%	1.7%	0.6%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2014	95.7%	2.1%	1.0%	0.2%	1.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2015	94.2%	2.5%	1.9%	0.1%	1.2%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2016	94.4%	1.7%	3.0%	0.1%	0.7%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2017	94.7%	1.3%	3.0%	0.3%	0.7%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2018	91.9%	3.5%	2.6%	1.2%	0.8%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2019	91.3%	4.2%	2.7%	1.7%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2020	91.3%	5.0%	1.9%	1.8%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2021	93.1%	5.0%	0.3%	1.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2022	91.7%	5.7%	1.0%	1.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	94.2%	3.8%	1.3%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	94.4%	3.8%	1.3%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2014 at 95.7%. Overall it rose from 90.4% in 2009 to 94.4% in 2024, up 4.0 percentage points. It has risen in each of the last 2 releases.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 1.8% to 0.5% of workers (down 1.3 percentage points).

Working from home peaked at 5.7% in 2022 and has since fallen back to 3.8%.

Commute Start Times in Smith County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Smith County?

The bars show when commuters in Smith 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 Mississippi for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Smith County3.7% Mississippi6.6%	3.7%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Smith County4.0% Mississippi4.5%	4.0%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Smith County6.4% Mississippi5.3%	6.4%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Smith County12.8% Mississippi11.1%	12.8%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Smith County14.4% Mississippi12.4%	14.4%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Smith County23.6% Mississippi17.1%	23.6%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Smith County8.9% Mississippi12.6%	8.9%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Smith County8.9% Mississippi8.2%	8.9%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Smith County1.1% Mississippi3.0%	1.1%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Smith County0.8% Mississippi4.0%	0.8%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Smith County1.2% Mississippi2.1%	1.2%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Smith County1.5% Mississippi0.8%	1.5%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Smith County6.0% Mississippi5.8%	6.0%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Smith County6.5% Mississippi6.4%	6.5%

Smith County Mississippi Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Smith County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 23.6% of commuters leave home, compared with 17.1% across Mississippi. Early starts are less common than in Mississippi: 14.2% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 16.4% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in Mississippi: 55.9% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 50.4% there. About 1 in 6 commuters (16.0%) 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 Smith 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 Smith 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 Smith County next to Mississippi 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.

• Smith County
• Mississippi
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Smith County	Mississippi	United States
2009	6:53 AM	7:20 AM	7:37 AM
2010	6:51 AM	7:21 AM	7:38 AM
2011	6:54 AM	7:20 AM	7:38 AM
2012	6:49 AM	7:20 AM	7:38 AM
2013	6:54 AM	7:20 AM	7:39 AM
2014	6:57 AM	7:20 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:02 AM	7:20 AM	7:38 AM
2016	6:55 AM	7:20 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:04 AM	7:19 AM	7:38 AM
2018	6:56 AM	7:19 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:01 AM	7:19 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:03 AM	7:19 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:08 AM	7:18 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:12 AM	7:18 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:10 AM	7:18 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:11 AM	7:18 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Smith County were on the road by 7:11 AM, 18 minutes later than in 2009 (6:53 AM). That goes against the trend across Mississippi, where the typical commuter now leaves 3 minutes earlier than in 2009. Commuters in Smith County now leave 27 minutes earlier than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM). Since the 2019 release, which covers the years just before the pandemic, the typical start in Smith County has moved 10 minutes later.

How does Smith County's commute time compare?

Metric	Smith County	Mississippi	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	26.8 min	21.5 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	06:30 AM – 06:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	3.8%	5.9%	15.0%
Walked	0.5%	1.3%	2.4%
Public Transit	< 0.1%	0.3%	3.2%

The average commute time in Smith County is 26.8 minutes, longer than the 21.5 minutes in Mississippi.

0.0% commute by public transit, lower than the 0.3% in Mississippi. 0.5% commute by walking, lower than the 1.3% in Mississippi.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau