Demographic Brief · Denver Metro · 2026

The age spread across Denver-adjacent cities

Median age tells one story. The full age distribution tells a different one — and reveals which neighbors are young-renter cities, which are aging in place, and which have the dependency profile of a retirement community.

Source: ACS 2023 5-Year Estimates · Table S0101 · 14 places adjacent to Denver

Population by age cohort

Each bar shows 100% of a city's population, broken into five age groups. Cities are ordered by median age — youngest at top.

Under 20
20–34
35–54
55–64
65+

Young vs. old: a population pyramid in miniature

The share of 20–34 year-olds compared to the share 65 and over. A ratio above 1.0 means more young adults than seniors; below 1.0 means the inverse. The most demographically lopsided cities sit at both extremes.

65 and over →
← 20 to 34
Ratio
What the numbers say
23×
Glendale's young-to-old ratio
Glendale has 55% of its population aged 20–34 and just 2% over 65 — a 23-to-1 ratio. It is essentially a young-renter island, dominated by Cherry Creek apartment density. No other Denver-adjacent city comes close.
0.20×
Cherry Hills Village ratio
Cherry Hills inverts the picture: 23% over 65, just 6% aged 20–34. The 20-something cohort is smaller than the under-5 cohort. This is a structural consequence of large-lot single-family zoning that has effectively excluded young households for decades.
29.4%
Denver's 20–34 share
Among large neighbors, only Denver and Edgewater break 29% in the prime household-formation cohort. Lakewood (26%), Westminster (24%), and Arvada (19%) trail meaningfully — and Arvada now has a near 1-to-1 ratio of seniors to young adults.
17.4 yrs
Median age range
From Glendale (30.7) to Cherry Hills Village (47.9), the spread across Denver-adjacent cities is wider than the gap between most U.S. states. Local zoning regimes — not regional housing demand — explain most of the variation.

Note on cohorts. ACS Table S0101 reports population in five-year age brackets. "Under 20" combines under-5 through 15–19; the standard "under 18" definition isn't directly available in this table without a derived calculation. Cohort percentages may not sum to 100% due to rounding.

Note on city selection. Includes the 14 incorporated municipalities that share a border with the City and County of Denver, plus Denver itself. Excludes unincorporated Adams, Arapahoe, and Jefferson County areas, which collectively house a substantial share of the metro population but are not municipalities.

Note on Glendale. Two Colorado places carry the name. The Glendale shown here is the Arapahoe County enclave surrounded by Denver (pop. 4,546), not the unrelated Glendale CDP elsewhere in the state.