Billings Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 2:56 PM

Is the commute in Billings longer than the national average?

Map AI 9/24/26, 2:56 PM

Commute Time Burden in Billings: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Billings spend about 32 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 131 hours, about 5.5 full days, spent commuting. That is 2% less time on the road than the Montana average of 16.0 minutes each way, a difference of 0.3 minutes.

Billings holds about 8.4% of Montana's population but accounts for roughly 8.3% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Billings would save about 53 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,629 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)
Billings	15.8 min	31.5 min	131 hrs/yr	$4,071	2,581
Montana	16.0 min	32.1 min	134 hrs/yr	$4,143	403
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.

Billings Commute Map

On average, it takes 15.8 minutes to get to work in Billings. That's 30% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM, followed by 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 8.7% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Billings

Riding a motorcycle is unusually rare in Billings: 3.7 times less than the Montana average (0.0% vs 0.1%).

Taking a taxi is unusually rare in Billings: 214.5 times less than the Montana average (0.0% vs 0.1%).

Commute Mode Trends in Billings, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Billings 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	Walked	Public Transportation	Other	Bicycle	Taxi	Motorcycle
2009	90.5%	3.1%	3.2%	1.6%	0.4%	0.8%	0.2%	0.3%
2010	90.4%	3.3%	3.3%	1.6%	0.5%	0.7%	0.1%	0.3%
2011	89.8%	3.6%	3.4%	1.8%	0.4%	0.7%	0.0%	0.2%
2012	89.8%	3.4%	3.7%	1.4%	0.5%	0.9%	0.0%	0.2%
2013	89.5%	4.0%	3.5%	1.0%	0.6%	1.1%	0.1%	0.2%
2014	90.2%	3.6%	3.3%	1.2%	0.5%	1.0%	0.1%	0.1%
2015	90.2%	3.6%	3.4%	1.2%	0.5%	0.9%	0.1%	0.1%
2016	90.3%	3.6%	3.4%	1.1%	0.6%	0.9%	0.0%	0.1%
2017	90.8%	3.8%	3.2%	0.8%	0.5%	0.7%	0.0%	0.1%
2018	91.5%	3.4%	3.0%	0.8%	0.5%	0.8%	0.0%	0.1%
2019	91.2%	3.6%	3.2%	0.7%	0.6%	0.7%	0.1%	0.1%
2020	89.7%	5.1%	2.7%	1.1%	0.7%	0.7%	0.1%	0.0%
2021	89.1%	5.9%	2.6%	1.2%	0.6%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%
2022	87.6%	7.1%	2.1%	1.3%	0.9%	0.8%	0.0%	0.1%
2023	87.2%	7.9%	2.2%	1.0%	0.9%	0.7%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	86.1%	8.7%	2.2%	1.2%	1.1%	0.7%	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 2018 at 91.5%. Overall it fell from 90.5% in 2009 to 86.1% in 2024, down 4.4 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 6 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Billings: its share of workers rose from 3.1% in 2009 to 8.7% in 2024, up 5.6 percentage points. Most of that increase, 5.1 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 3.2% to 2.2% of workers (down 1.0 percentage points).

Working from home overtook walking to become the 2nd most common choice in the 2013 release and has stayed ahead since.

Commute Start Times in Billings

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Billings?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		3.2%
5:00-5:29 AM		1.7%
5:30-5:59 AM		3.7%
6:00-6:29 AM		5.7%
6:30-6:59 AM		12.8%
7:00-7:29 AM		14.1%
7:30-7:59 AM		18.4%
8:00-8:29 AM		11.3%
8:30-8:59 AM		6.3%
9:00-9:59 AM		5.8%
10:00-10:59 AM		3.2%
11:00-11:59 AM		1.7%
12:00-3:59 PM		5.9%
4:00-11:59 PM		6.0%

Billings Montana Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Billings is 7:30-7:59 AM, when 18.4% of commuters leave home, compared with 19.2% across Montana. Early starts are less common than in Montana: 8.7% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 10.7% there. The morning rush looks much like Montana's: 56.7% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 55.0% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (22.6%) 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 Billings, 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 Billings 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 Billings next to Montana 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	Billings	Montana	United States
2009	7:49 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:47 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:47 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:48 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:49 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:47 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:45 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:45 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:44 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:43 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:46 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:47 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:47 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:47 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:44 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:44 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Billings were on the road by 7:44 AM, 5 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:49 AM). The shift is sharper than across Montana, where the typical start moved 2 minutes earlier. Commuters in Billings now leave 6 minutes later than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM).

How does Billings's commute time compare?

Metric	Billings	Montana	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	15.8 min	16.0 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	8.7%	12.5%	15.0%
Walked	2.2%	3.9%	2.4%
Public Transit	1.2%	0.6%	3.2%

The average commute time in Billings is about the same as in Montana.

1.2% commute by public transit, higher than the 0.6% in Montana. 2.2% commute by walking, lower than the 3.9% in Montana.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Billings, Montana.

What is the financial impact of commuting in Billings, Montana?

Commuters here spend an estimated 131 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $4,071 at a typical national wage. That's 2% less than the typical Montana commuter spends.

What are the busiest morning travel hours in Billings, Montana?

Traffic peaks between 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM in Billings, Montana. Leaving before or after this window is the single easiest way to avoid the heaviest local congestion, though 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM also sees a secondary bump.