{"metadata":{"title":"Coldest U.S. States in Winter","page_url":"https://plainclimate.com/rankings/coldest-states-us","source":"NOAA 1991-2020 U.S. Climate Normals","source_url":"https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/land-based-station/us-climate-normals","vintage":"2026-07-31","license":"CC0 1.0","license_url":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/","citation":"PlainClimate, \"Coldest U.S. States in Winter\". https://plainclimate.com/rankings/coldest-states-us","position_semantics":"Display order, not competition rank; equal metric values remain tied and use a stable name tiebreaker.","methodology":"Ranking values are ordered directly from the cited NOAA-derived fields shown on the source page.","methodology_url":"https://plainclimate.com/methodology","row_count":10},"data":[{"position":1,"state":"North Dakota","state_code":"ND","winter_mean_temp_f":13.4,"annual_rank":2},{"position":2,"state":"Alaska","state_code":"AK","winter_mean_temp_f":13.8,"annual_rank":1},{"position":3,"state":"Minnesota","state_code":"MN","winter_mean_temp_f":14.3,"annual_rank":3},{"position":4,"state":"Wisconsin","state_code":"WI","winter_mean_temp_f":19.5,"annual_rank":8},{"position":5,"state":"Maine","state_code":"ME","winter_mean_temp_f":19.9,"annual_rank":4},{"position":6,"state":"Vermont","state_code":"VT","winter_mean_temp_f":20.2,"annual_rank":7},{"position":7,"state":"South Dakota","state_code":"SD","winter_mean_temp_f":20.9,"annual_rank":11},{"position":8,"state":"New Hampshire","state_code":"NH","winter_mean_temp_f":22.2,"annual_rank":8},{"position":9,"state":"Iowa","state_code":"IA","winter_mean_temp_f":22.3,"annual_rank":15},{"position":10,"state":"Wyoming","state_code":"WY","winter_mean_temp_f":22.6,"annual_rank":5}]}