What's the Compact SUV Capital of America?

CARS.COM — Compact SUVs have shot up in popularity the past several years, with car shoppers appreciating their mix of versatile cargo space and extra ride height but without sacrificing too much in the way of ride quality or fuel economy.

Related: What’s the Mid-Size Sedan Capital of America?

To find where compact SUVs are most prevalent, we examined Cars.com inventory of new compact SUVs that are currently on sale*, excluding luxury models and hybrids. Next, we examined Cars.com users’ site activity to see how much interest each city had in these vehicles. The top cities have a high mix of inventory and interest in compact SUVs, and vice versa for the bottom cities. Our search was also limited to U.S. markets (a city and its suburbs) with more than 500,000 residents.

Here are the 20 cities where compact SUVs are most popular:

1. Chicago
2. Baltimore
3. Washington, D.C.
4. Seattle
5. Louisville, Ky.
6. Milwaukee
7. Cincinnati
8. Columbus, Ohio
9. Indianapolis
10. Kansas City, Mo.
11. Portland, Ore.
12. Lexington, Ky.
13. Denver
14. Des Moines, Iowa
15. Providence, R.I.
16. Fort Wayne, Ind.
17. Boise, Idaho
18. Cleveland
19. Roanoke, Va.
20. Tri-Cities, Tenn.

And at the bottom, the following cities showed less interest in compact SUVs:

1. Harlingen, Texas
2. Bakersfield, Calif.
3. Corpus Christi, Texas
4. Savannah, Ga.
5. Albuquerque, N.M.
6. Fargo, N.D.
7. Sioux Falls, S.D.
8. San Antonio
9. Burlington, Vt.
10. Honolulu
11. Lafayette, La.
12. Traverse City, Mich.
13. Chico, Calif.
14. Portland, Maine
15. El Paso, Texas
16. Santa Barbara, Calif.
17. Fort Myers, Fla.
18. Tyler, Texas
19. Monterey, Calif.
20. Amarillo, Texas

Chicago has been popular lately: Aside from ending a 108-year World Series drought, it’s also been coming out on top of our recent lists: it was also the top city for mid-size sedans and minivans.

*Models included the Chevrolet Equinox, Ford Escape, GMC Terrain, Honda CR-V, Hyundai Tucson, Jeep Cherokee, Jeep Compass, Jeep Patriot, Kia Sportage, Mazda CX-5, Mini Countryman, Mitsubishi Outlander Sport, Nissan Rogue, Subaru Forester, Toyota RAV4 and Volkswagen Tiguan.

Cars.com data compiled by David Greene.