Mercer County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Mercer County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Mercer County spend about 32 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 133 hours, about 5.5 full days, spent commuting. That is 24% less time on the road than the Ohio average of 21.1 minutes each way, a difference of 5.1 minutes.

Mercer County holds about 0.4% of Ohio's population but accounts for roughly 0.3% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Mercer County would save about 53 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,651 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)
Mercer County	16.0 min	32.0 min	133 hrs/yr	$4,128	751
Ohio	21.1 min	42.2 min	176 hrs/yr	$5,447	1,212
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: Ohio Counties

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 16.0 minutes to get to work in Mercer County. That's 29% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

Among the top 3 fastest counties in Ohio

The most common departure window is 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM, followed by 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 4.4% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Mercer County

• Car: 93.0%
• Worked at Home: 4.4%
• Walked: 1.7%
• Bicycle: 0.4%
• Other: 0.3%
• Public Transportation: < 0.1% unusually low
• Motorcycle: < 0.1%
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low

Public transit is unusually rare in Mercer County: 10.7 times less than the Ohio average (0.1% vs 1.0%).

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Mercer County, versus 0.2% in Ohio.

Commute Mode Trends in Mercer County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Mercer 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
• Walked
• Bicycle
• Other
• Public Transportation
• Motorcycle
• Taxi

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Walked	Bicycle	Other	Public Transportation	Motorcycle	Taxi
2009	91.2%	4.4%	2.8%	0.6%	0.3%	0.5%	0.1%	0.0%
2010	91.4%	4.5%	2.3%	0.7%	0.3%	0.5%	0.3%	0.0%
2011	93.2%	3.6%	1.7%	0.7%	0.3%	0.2%	0.2%	0.0%
2012	93.7%	3.4%	1.9%	0.4%	0.2%	0.2%	0.3%	0.0%
2013	94.1%	3.2%	1.4%	0.4%	0.4%	0.2%	0.2%	0.0%
2014	94.1%	2.9%	1.5%	0.5%	0.5%	0.2%	0.2%	0.0%
2015	94.6%	2.3%	1.4%	0.5%	0.5%	0.4%	0.2%	0.0%
2016	95.1%	1.9%	1.5%	0.4%	0.5%	0.4%	0.3%	0.0%
2017	95.0%	2.3%	1.4%	0.3%	0.4%	0.3%	0.2%	0.0%
2018	95.1%	2.2%	1.5%	0.3%	0.4%	0.4%	0.1%	0.0%
2019	95.5%	2.1%	1.6%	0.1%	0.3%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%
2020	95.8%	2.3%	1.4%	0.1%	0.2%	0.1%	0.1%	0.0%
2021	94.9%	3.1%	1.3%	0.1%	0.3%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%
2022	94.5%	3.2%	1.6%	0.1%	0.4%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%
2023	93.8%	3.7%	1.6%	0.3%	0.3%	0.1%	0.1%	0.0%
2024	93.0%	4.4%	1.7%	0.4%	0.3%	0.1%	0.1%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2020 at 95.8%. Overall it rose from 91.2% in 2009 to 93.0% in 2024, up 1.8 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 4 releases.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 2.8% to 1.7% of workers (down 1.1 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Mercer County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Mercer County?

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

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Mercer County8.2% Ohio5.2%	8.2%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Mercer County5.0% Ohio3.9%	5.0%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Mercer County7.0% Ohio5.3%	7.0%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Mercer County9.0% Ohio8.4%	9.0%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Mercer County11.7% Ohio10.1%	11.7%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Mercer County13.7% Ohio13.4%	13.7%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Mercer County11.7% Ohio12.2%	11.7%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Mercer County8.8% Ohio10.5%	8.8%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Mercer County3.4% Ohio5.5%	3.4%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Mercer County3.5% Ohio6.0%	3.5%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Mercer County1.8% Ohio2.8%	1.8%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Mercer County0.7% Ohio1.5%	0.7%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Mercer County9.1% Ohio7.7%	9.1%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Mercer County6.5% Ohio7.8%	6.5%

Mercer County Ohio Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Mercer County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 13.7% of commuters leave home, compared with 13.4% across Ohio. Early starts are more common than in Ohio: 20.1% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.3% there. The morning rush looks much like Ohio's: 45.9% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 46.2% there. About 1 in 5 commuters (21.6%) 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 Mercer 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 Mercer 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 Mercer County next to Ohio 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.

• Mercer County
• Ohio
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Mercer County	Ohio	United States
2009	7:34 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:33 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:32 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:30 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:32 AM	7:42 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:28 AM	7:42 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:26 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:25 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:24 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:22 AM	7:40 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:20 AM	7:40 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:21 AM	7:39 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:21 AM	7:39 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:20 AM	7:39 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:20 AM	7:39 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:20 AM	7:39 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Mercer County were on the road by 7:20 AM, 14 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:34 AM). The shift is sharper than across Ohio, where the typical start moved 3 minutes earlier. Commuters in Mercer County now leave 18 minutes earlier than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM).

How does Mercer County's commute time compare?

Metric	Mercer County	Ohio	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	16.0 min	21.1 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	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	4.4%	13.0%	15.0%
Walked	1.7%	2.0%	2.4%
Public Transit	< 0.1%	1.0%	3.2%

The average commute time in Mercer County is 16.0 minutes, shorter than the 21.1 minutes in Ohio.

0.1% commute by public transit, lower than the 1.0% in Ohio. 1.7% commute by walking, lower than the 2.0% in Ohio.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau