Wausau Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 4:30 PM

How long is the round-trip commute in Wausau?

Map AI 9/24/26, 4:30 PM

Commute Time Burden in Wausau: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Wausau spend about 30 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 126 hours, about 5.3 full days, spent commuting. That is 19% less time on the road than the Wisconsin average of 18.8 minutes each way, a difference of 3.6 minutes.

Wausau holds about 0.5% of Wisconsin's population but accounts for roughly 0.4% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Wausau would save about 51 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,568 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)
Wausau	15.2 min	30.3 min	126 hrs/yr	$3,919	1,742
Wisconsin	18.8 min	37.5 min	156 hrs/yr	$4,846	811
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.

Wausau Commute Map

On average, it takes 15.2 minutes to get to work in Wausau. That's 32% 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 14.1% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Wausau

Taking a taxi is unusually common in Wausau: 3.0 times more than the Wisconsin average (0.5% vs 0.2%).

Commute Mode Trends in Wausau, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Wausau 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	Other	Public Transportation	Bicycle	Taxi	Motorcycle
2009	90.1%	2.5%	3.5%	1.0%	1.9%	0.9%	0.0%	0.1%
2010	89.5%	3.2%	3.7%	0.5%	2.0%	0.8%	0.1%	0.2%
2011	89.9%	2.7%	3.9%	0.3%	2.0%	0.7%	0.2%	0.3%
2012	89.8%	2.6%	3.5%	0.2%	2.0%	1.2%	0.5%	0.3%
2013	89.6%	2.8%	3.7%	0.5%	1.6%	1.1%	0.4%	0.2%
2014	90.6%	2.6%	3.4%	0.4%	1.2%	1.2%	0.4%	0.2%
2015	90.3%	2.8%	3.5%	0.4%	1.3%	1.2%	0.3%	0.2%
2016	89.9%	3.2%	3.6%	0.4%	1.3%	1.2%	0.3%	0.1%
2017	90.7%	3.4%	3.5%	0.5%	1.1%	0.5%	0.0%	0.2%
2018	89.7%	3.8%	3.5%	0.9%	1.5%	0.4%	0.0%	0.2%
2019	89.5%	3.8%	3.6%	0.9%	1.4%	0.4%	0.3%	0.2%
2020	87.3%	6.3%	3.3%	1.1%	1.2%	0.4%	0.3%	0.1%
2021	85.3%	8.6%	2.6%	1.2%	0.9%	0.6%	0.6%	0.2%
2022	84.3%	9.4%	2.5%	1.3%	1.2%	0.5%	0.7%	0.1%
2023	81.2%	12.4%	2.8%	0.9%	1.1%	0.7%	0.8%	0.1%
2024	79.6%	14.1%	3.0%	1.1%	0.9%	0.7%	0.5%	0.1%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2017 at 90.7%. Overall it fell from 90.1% in 2009 to 79.6% in 2024, down 10.5 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 7 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Wausau: its share of workers rose from 2.5% in 2009 to 14.1% in 2024, up 11.6 percentage points. Most of that increase, 10.3 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Public transit lost the most ground, falling from 1.9% to 0.9% of workers (down 1.0 percentage points).

Working from home overtook walking to become the 2nd most common choice in the 2018 release and has stayed ahead since.

Commute Start Times in Wausau

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Wausau?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		5.4%
5:00-5:29 AM		4.7%
5:30-5:59 AM		4.1%
6:00-6:29 AM		7.6%
6:30-6:59 AM		10.6%
7:00-7:29 AM		10.8%
7:30-7:59 AM		14.8%
8:00-8:29 AM		10.5%
8:30-8:59 AM		2.5%
9:00-9:59 AM		4.9%
10:00-10:59 AM		4.9%
11:00-11:59 AM		2.5%
12:00-3:59 PM		7.4%
4:00-11:59 PM		9.3%

Wausau Wisconsin Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Wausau is 7:30-7:59 AM, when 14.8% of commuters leave home, compared with 12.7% across Wisconsin. Early starts are less common than in Wisconsin: 14.3% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 17.7% there. The morning rush looks much like Wisconsin's: 46.7% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 46.8% there. About 1 in 3 commuters (29.0%) 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 Wausau, 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 Wausau 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 Wausau next to Wisconsin 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	Wausau	Wisconsin	United States
2009	7:41 AM	7:30 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:44 AM	7:30 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:44 AM	7:30 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:45 AM	7:31 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:44 AM	7:31 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:45 AM	7:30 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:42 AM	7:30 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:41 AM	7:29 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:40 AM	7:29 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:41 AM	7:28 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:38 AM	7:27 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:37 AM	7:27 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:41 AM	7:27 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:42 AM	7:27 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:41 AM	7:27 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:44 AM	7:27 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Wausau were on the road by 7:44 AM, 2 minutes later than in 2009 (7:41 AM). That goes against the trend across Wisconsin, where the typical commuter now leaves 3 minutes earlier than in 2009. Commuters in Wausau now leave 6 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 Wausau has moved 6 minutes later.

How does Wausau's commute time compare?

Metric	Wausau	Wisconsin	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	15.2 min	18.8 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	14.1%	13.1%	15.0%
Walked	3.0%	2.6%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.9%	1.1%	3.2%

The average commute time in Wausau is 15.2 minutes, shorter than the 18.8 minutes in Wisconsin.

0.9% commute by public transit, lower than the 1.1% in Wisconsin. 3.0% commute by walking, higher than the 2.6% in Wisconsin.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Wausau, Wisconsin.

How much does the average commute cost workers in Wausau, Wisconsin?

Commuters here spend an estimated 126 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $3,919 at a typical national wage. That's 19% less than the typical Wisconsin commuter spends.

When is rush hour worst in Wausau, Wisconsin?

Traffic peaks between 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM in Wausau, Wisconsin. 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.