PlainCost
Home / Compare /

Rochester vs Lewiston

Cost of living comparison based on BEA Regional Price Parities. Lewiston is 0.4% more expensive than Rochester.

0.4% more expensive

Lewiston, ID-WA is 0.4% more expensive than Rochester, MN on BEA Regional Price Parities (overall RPP 91.2 vs 90.8). A $100,000 salary in Rochester buys about the same as $100,373 in Lewiston; the largest component gap is services.

  • Overall RPP 90.8 (Rochester) vs 91.2 (Lewiston)
  • $100k in Rochester ≈ $100,373 purchasing power in Lewiston
  • Services drives the gap (-14.8 RPP points)

RPP parity plate

Pair MN:ID 90.8→91.2

PHOTO-FINISH · CROSS-STATE · SPLIT-BUDGET · BOTH-BELOW · PP-PAR

  • PHOTO-FINISH Photo finish
  • CROSS-STATE MN × ID
  • SPLIT-BUDGET Split budget
  • BOTH-BELOW Both below 100
  • PP-PAR PP near-par

Instrument codes from this pair's BEA Regional Price Parities (overall · goods · services · rents · national benchmark 100 · purchasing-power conversion), not a ranking or recommendation.

Rochester
90.8
Cost Index
Lewiston
91.2
Cost Index

What This Comparison Actually Tells You

Rochester, MN and Lewiston, ID-WA are a photo finish on overall price level, only 0.3 RPP points apart. A salary conversion is therefore a fine adjustment, not evidence of a fundamentally different cost regime.

Services creates the largest separation: Lewiston is 14.8 points lower. But services and rents move against the overall direction, so this is a split budget rather than a clean across-the-board winner.

Comparable population context is incomplete for this pair, so no market-scale explanation is inferred from the price indexes.

Both metros remain below the U.S. benchmark of 100. This comparison chooses between two below-average price levels; “more expensive” here does not mean nationally expensive.

For a service-heavy household, test childcare, health, and other locally supplied costs before relying on rent alone. The BEA ratio converts $100,000 in Rochester to $100,373 in Lewiston, but it is not a personal spending weight.

Category Breakdown

Visual Comparison

Overall
Rochester
90.8
Lewiston
91.2
Goods
Rochester
95.4
Lewiston
96.2
Services
Rochester
87.4
Lewiston
72.6
Rents
Rochester
78.6
Lewiston
71.9

Vertical line = national average (100)

Salary Equivalents

What a salary in Rochester would need to be in Lewiston for the same purchasing power:

In Rochester In Lewiston Difference
$50,000 $50,187 +$187
$75,000 $75,280 +$280
$100,000 $100,373 +$373
$150,000 $150,560 +$560
$ in Rochester = – in Lewiston

Same BEA Regional Price Parity ratio as the table above (90.8 → 91.2), computed live from your number, nothing is sent anywhere.

Reverse: Lewiston → Rochester Rochester Details Lewiston Details

Also Compare

vs Baton Rouge vs Fargo vs Saginaw vs Clarksville vs Erie vs College Station-Bryan vs Killeen-Temple vs Staunton-Stuarts Draft

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Lewiston more expensive than Rochester?

Lewiston is 0.4% more expensive than Rochester. The overall cost index is 91.2 vs 90.8 (national average = 100).

What salary in Lewiston equals $100K in Rochester?

A $100,000 salary in Rochester has the same purchasing power as $100,373 in Lewiston. This is based on the BEA Regional Price Parity indexes.

How do rents compare between Rochester and Lewiston?

Rents in Rochester are indexed at 78.6 while Lewiston is at 71.9 (national average = 100). Rochester has higher rents.

Data sources

Data sourced from official public datasets, Regional Price Parities (2024), index where national average = 100. Retrieved and formatted by PlainCost. See our methodology for details.

Every figure on PlainCost is rendered directly from BEA Regional Price Parity source data, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, our changelog, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026-08-11. Rankings measure the published cost-of-living index only; we don't recommend where to live or rate any metro's quality of life.