Grand Rapids Is Number One Again! We're Beer City, USA!

Yes, it happened again, Grand Rapids has reclaimed the crown! USA Today was again looking for the best beer scene in the USA, and 20-cities popped up as some of the best. A panel of beer experts were did the final judging, and the number one city according to USA Today is right here is West Michigan, Grand Rapids!

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It's not just the city proper, because within a 30 minute drive you’ll find so many breweries with very tasty beer. They’re not all competing against each other, either, but have really formed a brewing community to support one another.

Andy Rent/TSM

WZZM13 reported that according to a 2019 Economic Impact Report of Beer Tourism in Kent County commissioned by Experience Grand Rapids, there were around 40 breweries in Grand Rapids with over 80 in the Greater West Michigan area while generating over $38 million in the county at that time.

So, Grand Rapids gets to celebrate 10 years as Beer City, USA, and has received so many other accolades as well, such as USA Today’s America’s Best Beer Town in 2014, Best Beer Scene in 2017 and Best Beer City in 2021 and now, 2022.

FOUNDERS BREWERY

Google Street View

USA Today said that we’re led, of course, by the world-renowned Founders Brewing Co.

BREWERY VIVANT

Google Street View

But, also by the Belgian-inspired Brewery Vivant.

SICILIANO'S MARKET

Google Street View

And they said also by beer stores like Siciliano’s Market on Lake Michigan Drive.

So, what other cities are on the list?

Madison, Wisconsin and Indianapolis, Indiana in the second and third. The rest of the top 20 are:

Asheville, North Carolina
Atlanta Georgia
Bend, Oregon
Boston, Massachusetts
Charlotte, North Carolina
Chicago, Illinois
Denver, Colorado
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
New York, New York
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Portland, Maine
Portland, Oregon
San Diego, California
San Francisco, California
Seattle, Washington
St. Louis, Missouri

LOOK: Best Beers From Every State

To find the best beer in each state and Washington D.C., Stacker analyzed January 2020 data from BeerAdvocate, a website that gathers user scores for beer in real-time. BeerAdvocate makes its determinations by compiling consumer ratings for all 50 states and Washington D.C. and applying a weighted rank to each. The weighted rank pulls the beer toward the list's average based on the number of ratings it has and aims to allow lesser-known beers to increase in rank. Only beers with at least 10 rankings to be considered; we took it a step further to only include beers with at least 100 user rankings in our gallery. Keep reading to find out what the best beer is in each of the 50 states and Washington D.C.