The Best — And Worst — Cities For Fourth Of July Celebrations

NEW YORK, NY — It's that time of year again when people young and old stand around and watch as colorful explosions illuminate the night sky and thunderous booms rumble beneath our feet. Few things bring people together more than the Fourth of July, but a new report says some cities do it way better than others.

To mark America's birthday, the personal finance website WalletHub ranked the 100 largest cities based on five key factors: celebrations, affordability, attractions and activities, safety and accessibility and, of course, the weather forecast. These were evaluated based on 19 weighted metrics, including number of festivals and performances, popularity, averge costs of a hamburger and beer, walkability and even forecasted rain.

Here are the top 20 cities and their overall scores.

1. New York, NY; 72.14
2. Los Angeles, CA; 71.36
3. Chicago, IL; 68.30
4. Denver, CO; 67.12
5. Seattle, WA; 65.85
6. Atlanta, GA; 65.85
7. Milwaukee, WI; 64.61
8. San Diego, CA; 64.39
9. Washington, DC; 63.74
10. Buffalo, NY; 63.11
11. Dallas, TX; 63.11
12. New Orleans, LA; 62.82
13. Minneapolis, MN; 60.40
14. Las Vegas, NV; 60.82
15. Sacramento, CA; 59.73
16. St. Louis, MO; 59.31
17. Madison, WI; 58.49
18. San Francisco, CA; 58.47
19. Portland, OR; 57.91
20. Boise, ID; 57.33

The bottom five cities on the list are: San Bernardino, California; Hialeah, Florida; Memphis, Tennessee; Winston-Salem, North Carolina; Garland, Texas; and Laredo, Texas.

Other interesting findings: Indianapolis, Toledo, Ohio, and Laredo, Texas have the lowest average beer and wine prices. On the flip side, those in Seattle, New York City and Anchorage, Alaska, will pay the most for beer and wine on average.

And if you live in Florida, you may want to consider a last-minute road trip, with Miami, Hialeah, Tampa, Orlando and St. Petersburg all ranked the worst when it comes to weather forecast as the region expects thunderstorms to roll through. Those fireworks-goers might consider heading to Seattle, Fresno, Colorado Springs, Omaha or Portland, Oregon, which are expected to see the best weather.

WalletHub used data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau, Council for Community and Economic Research, Priceline Group, FBI, INRIX, American Pyrotechnics Association, WalkScore, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Eventbrite, AccuWeather, Kayak.com, Yelp and its own research.

Photo credit: Shutterstock