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Boise, Idaho is consistently ranked as one of the best places to live and work in the country, and Idaho has earned recent accolades as one of the states with the highest rates of innovation, most patents awarded per capita, highest population rates of growth, and most dynamic and resilient economies.

In Idaho, a majority of exports are now concentrated in high technology, and high-tech industries make a greater contribution to Idaho's GDP than all of the state's traditional industries combined.  In 2010, the Martin Prosperity Institute ranked Idaho third on its list of America's most innovative states, noting that "Boise has long been home to a vibrant, high-tech scene."  Also in 2010, Idaho was ranked seventh among the states in economic outlook, and fifth on Kauffman's Index of Entrepreneurial Activity.  In September 2010,
USA Today reported that Idaho was experiencing the biggest economic rebound in the country. In 2011, researchers at George Mason University ranked Idaho fourth among the states in policies promoting individual freedoms in the personal, social and economic spheres.

Since 2005, Boise has been ranked by Forbes magazine as one of the top ten places in the country for business and careers. In 2008, MSNBC ranked Boise second on its list of best places to live in America, based on a merging of leading "best places" lists. In 2009,
U.S. News again ranked Boise as one of the ten best places to live in America, and Business Week ranked Boise as one of the best small cities for startups in the United States.

In 2010, Forbes ranked Boise as one of America's 20 most innovative cities in the country, on the basis of patents, funding, jobs and technology.  The same year, Sunset magazine listed Boise as one of the West's "20 Towns of the Future," and The Economist praised Boise and Idaho's open spaces as "the final frontier in the Internet age."  

Also in 2010, Best Life ranked Boise as one of the 20 best cities in the country to raise a family, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ranked Boise as one of the five healthiest and most active communities in the nation.  In addition, Outside magazine named Boise the No. 1 town in America, stating: "Boise, to put it mildly, has been on a roll."