What City Name Is in All 50 States? Riverside Comes Closest

Short answer: no city or town name is in all 50 states.

Riverside comes closest.

The federal list of US place names has a place called Riverside in 46 states, and only Alaska and Hawaii, plus Louisiana and Oklahoma, go without one.

Springfield, the name most of you probably guessed, turns up in 33.

I rewrote this page in October 2026.

The old version said Riverside was in every state but Hawaii and Springfield in 41, listed rivers where it promised towns, and dressed up the real Riversides with things that aren’t there.

Every count below is my own, from that federal list.

I’ll show you how I got each one, so you can check me.

What City Name is in All 50 States?

None.

Honestly, it’s a trick question.

But Riverside is the best answer you’ll get, 3 states ahead of the next name.

The US Geological Survey runs the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS), the federal standard for place names, and it publishes a national file of “populated places.”

I took the edition published on September 2, 2026, kept only the 50 states (no DC, no territories) and counted how many states have at least one place with exactly that name.

The top five, plus Springfield so you can compare:

Name	States with one (of 50)	Places with the name
Riverside	46	128
Centerville	43	107
Franklin	40	60
Fairview	40	210
Midway	39	214
Springfield	33	66

One catch, and it matters.

GNIS doesn’t sort its populated places by type.

A “place” can be a big city or a village, a neighborhood inside a bigger city or a crossroads with a few houses on it.

So read my table as “somewhere people call Riverside,” not “an incorporated city called Riverside.”

If you need the second thing, this table won’t tell you.

Georgia has the most Riversides, 10 of them.

Virginia is next with 7.

These are the ones you’re most likely to have heard of:

1. Riverside, California

The big one.

It’s the county seat of Riverside County, about 50 miles east of downtown Los Angeles, and it had 314,998 people at the 2020 census.

It’s named for its spot beside the Santa Ana River.

Riverside is the birthplace of the California citrus industry, and the Parent Washington Navel Orange Tree is still there (it’s the last of California’s two original navel orange trees, so yes, I’d go see a tree).

The Mission Inn is the nation’s largest Mission Revival Style building.

And the University of California, Riverside, is in the northeastern part of the city.

2. Riverside, Illinois

A village of 9,298 people in Cook County, around 9 miles west of downtown Chicago.

Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted designed it in 1869, and it’s arguably the first planned suburb in the country.

A big chunk of the village is a National Historic Landmark district, with the Des Plaines River along one edge.

Frank Lloyd Wright, Daniel Burnham and Louis Sullivan all designed homes there.

So if you’re into houses, it’s kinda worth a slow walk.

3. Riverside, Missouri

A small city of 4,013 people in Platte County, on the edge of the Missouri River and part of the Kansas City metro.

The Argosy casino sits along the river.

For years, though, the town was best known for its race track, which people called Pendergast Track after Kansas City’s political boss, Tom Pendergast.

4. Riverside, Rhode Island

Not a city at all.

It’s a neighborhood of East Providence with about 20,000 people, its own zip code (02915) and Narragansett Bay on its west side.

Crescent Park, the old amusement park, ran for 93 years, from 1886 until 1979.

The park is gone.

Its 1895 Looff Carousel survived, though, and it still runs every summer, which is the bit I’d want you to know if you’re nearby.

5. Riverside, Iowa

My favorite.

It’s a city of 1,060 people in Washington County, on the English River, and it calls itself the future birthplace of Captain James T. Kirk from Star Trek, with the agreement of the show’s creator, Gene Roddenberry.

Canonically he’ll be born on March 22, 2228, about 200 years from now.

So there’s no rush to book.

America’s Lesser-Known Riverside States

The old version of this section listed rivers (the Kenai, the Snake, the Chattahoochee), not towns.

Turns out the real list is more useful to you anyway.

These are all 46 states with a place called Riverside, and how many each one has:

State	Places called Riverside
Alabama	4
Arizona	1
Arkansas	4
California	4
Colorado	2
Connecticut	3
Delaware	1
Florida	3
Georgia	10
Idaho	3
Illinois	1
Indiana	3
Iowa	2
Kansas	2
Kentucky	1
Maine	1
Maryland	4
Massachusetts	4
Michigan	2
Minnesota	1
Mississippi	2
Missouri	3
Montana	3
Nebraska	1
Nevada	1
New Hampshire	1
New Jersey	3
New Mexico	5
New York	4
North Carolina	4
North Dakota	1
Ohio	2
Oregon	3
Pennsylvania	3
Rhode Island	1
South Carolina	2
South Dakota	1
Tennessee	5
Texas	2
Utah	5
Vermont	2
Virginia	7
Washington	2
West Virginia	5
Wisconsin	3
Wyoming	1

Missing from the list: Alaska and Hawaii, plus Louisiana and Oklahoma.

If you’ve booked a hotel “in Riverside,” check the state and the zip code before you drive anywhere, because there are 128 of them, and your GPS won’t ask which one you meant.

How Many Cities Have the Same Name in the US?

More than half of all places, by my count.

In the same GNIS file there are 182,006 populated places in the 50 states, and they share 103,970 different names.

Of those places, 96,304 (that’s 52.9%) carry a name that’s also used in at least one other state, and 19,428 names show up in two states or more.

I was honestly surprised it’s that high, though once you think about how many Fairviews and Midways a country with this many crossroads would end up with, it makes sense.

The old page said 33% of US cities have duplicates and that 3,750 cities share a name.

I couldn’t find a source for either number, so they’re gone.

Same caveat as before (my counts include neighborhoods and tiny settlements, not only incorporated cities).

Springfield

Springfield is the name everybody guesses.

It’s a decent guess, just not the right one.

GNIS has 66 places called Springfield in 33 states, and you won’t find one in Arizona, Iowa, Kansas, Nevada, Utah or Washington (11 more states are missing one too).

The first one came early.

Springfield, Massachusetts, was founded in 1636, the first Springfield in the New World, about 390 years ago.

Springfield, Illinois, is that state’s capital, with 114,394 people at the 2020 census, and it sits along historic Route 66.

And Springfield, Oregon, was named after a natural spring in a field inside today’s city limits.

A Name Worth Remembering: Springfield’s Pop Culture Legacy

Then there’s the Simpsons.

Matt Groening named their Springfield after Springfield, Oregon, which as a kid he thought was the town in the 1950s sitcom Father Knows Best.

He also figured Springfield was one of the most common names for a city in the US.

And he hoped “everyone will think it’s their Springfield.”

The show also keeps the town’s geography deliberately impossible, so good luck finding it on your map.

Beverly Hills, California vs. Beverly Hills, Texas

Same name, very different places.

Beverly Hills, Texas, is a small enclave city in McLennan County with 1,878 people at the 2020 census, surrounded by Waco.

It’s not the only spare, either.

I counted 35 places called Beverly Hills in 20 states.

Is There a City Named Florida?

Yes, a few, and none of them is in Florida.

GNIS has 8 places called Florida in 7 states: Colorado, Indiana, Massachusetts, Missouri, New Mexico, New York and Ohio.

The three you can actually find on a road map:

• Florida, Massachusetts. A town in Berkshire County with 694 people at the 2020 census. Despite the name, it’s statistically the coldest and snowiest town in Massachusetts (which I love). The east portal of the Hoosac Tunnel is there, and so is Whitcomb Summit, at 2,172 ft the highest point of the Mohawk Trail.
• Florida, Missouri. A village in Monroe County on Mark Twain Lake, and it took its name from the state of Florida. Mark Twain was born there in 1835. Its population at the 2020 census: 5. Nope, not a typo.
• Florida, New York. A village of 2,888 people in Orange County, inside the town of Warwick.

The Significance of City Names in US Culture

A town’s name usually tells you who founded it, or who they wanted to honor.

These are the stories I’d tell you over a long layover:

• Pittsburgh. General John Forbes took the forks in 1758, then began Fort Pitt, named after William Pitt the Elder, while the settlement was named “Pittsborough.” So it’s named for a person, not for its geography, whatever this page used to say.
• New Orleans. It comes from the French La Nouvelle-Orléans, named for Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, who served as regent for Louis XV from 1715 to 1723.
• San Francisco. The presidio and the mission that settlers from New Spain founded in 1776 were both named for Francis of Assisi. The town itself was Yerba Buena until 1847.
• Santa Claus, Indiana. A town of 2,586 people with the world’s only post office named after Santa. It gets thousands of letters to him from all over the world every year.
• West, Texas. Named after Thomas West, its first postmaster, and not in West Texas at all (it’s about 20 miles north of Waco and about 70 miles south of the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex). It has one of the largest concentrations of Czech Texans in the state, and in 1997 it was designated “Home of the Official Kolache of the Texas Legislature.” If you’re passing through, you know what to do.

Which Cities in the US have the same name abroad?

Plenty, and some were named that way on purpose.

A few worth knowing before you type a city into a booking site and hit pay:

Memphis, Egypt vs. Memphis, Tennessee

Memphis, Tennessee, was founded on May 22, 1819, less than 5 months after the US took over the territory, by John Overton, James Winchester and Andrew Jackson.

They named it after the ancient capital of Egypt on the Nile.

Today’s Memphis sits on the Mississippi River instead, and it had 633,104 people at the 2020 census.

More in our guide to the most diverse city in Tennessee.

Melbourne, Florida vs. Melbourne, Australia

Melbourne, Florida, used to be called Crane Creek.

It got its name from its first postmaster, Cornthwaite John Hector, an Englishman who had spent much of his life in Melbourne, Australia.

Lebanon, New Hampshire vs Lebanon the country

Lebanon, New Hampshire, was named for Lebanon, Connecticut, where many of its early settlers came from, not for the country.

The old page said there are 47 places called Lebanon.

GNIS has 44, in 29 states.

Glasgow, Scotland vs. Glasgow, Montana

Glasgow, Montana, is the county seat of Valley County.

James Hill founded it in 1887 as a railroad town, and the name came from a globe: he and a local railroader spun it, and a finger landed on Glasgow, Scotland.

Way better than a committee, if you ask me.

It’s also the most populous city for over 110 miles, which tells you how empty that part of Montana is.

Lewis and Clark came within 15 miles of the spot back in 1804.

Granada, Spain vs. Grenada the island

Not quite the same name, which is the trap.

Granada, with an “a,” is a city in Andalusia, Spain, at the foot of the Sierra Nevada.

Grenada, with an “e,” is a country in the eastern Caribbean, the southernmost of the Windward Islands.

Check the spelling on your ticket before you pay, because that mix-up costs you a lot more than jet lag.

Paris, France vs. Paris, Texas

Paris, Texas, has its own Eiffel Tower, a replica 65 feet tall, put up in 1993.

In 1998 the city added a giant red cowboy hat on top, presumably in answer to the 60-foot tower that Paris, Tennessee, had built in 1993.

GNIS has 22 places called Paris in 20 states, so Texas has company.

Moscow, Russia vs. Moscow, Kansas

The Kansas one is tiny by comparison: a city of 272 people (2020 census) in Stevens County, with the Cimarron River 7 miles north of it.

Locals say MOS-koh.

For the Russian city, see what Moscow is famous for.

Naples, Italy vs. Naples, Florida

Naples, Florida, borrowed its name on purpose.

It caught on when promoters described the bay as “surpassing the bay in Naples, Italy.”

Bold claim.

Somewhere down the line you can judge for yourself.

For more numbers like these, see our US states and statistics guides.

Related read: The Caribbean Travel Guide — Instant PDF + Kindle download. Secure checkout by Stripe