Buffalo is one of the most attractive larger cities for people who are young, single, educated, and upwardly-mobile career starters. This makes it a good place to live for young singles in their 20s and 30s and who have undergraduate or graduate degrees and are starting their professional careers. Although Buffalo is a large city, this demographic is significant enough that young professionals will find many others like themselves here, with really good opportunities for friendships, recreation, romance, and more.

Buffalo has a lot of people who ride the bus to and from work. In fact, for its size, Buffalo has quite a high level of public transit users. Buffalo’s need for inexpensive transportation options for its citizens is quite high.

The overall education level of Buffalo is somewhat higher than in the average US city of 21.84%: 26.63% of adults 25 and older in the city have at least a bachelor's degree.

The per capita income in Buffalo in 2010 was $23,397, which is low income relative to New York, and lower middle income relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $93,588 for a family of four. However, Buffalo contains both very wealthy and poor people as well. Buffalo also has one of the higher rates of people living in poverty in the nation, with 30.26% of its population below the federal poverty line.

Buffalo is an extremely ethnically-diverse city. The people who call Buffalo home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Buffalo residents report their race to be White, followed by Black or African-American. Buffalo also has a sizeable Hispanic population (people of Hispanic origin can be of any race). People of Hispanic or Latino origin account for 11.59% of the city’s residents. Important ancestries of people in Buffalo include Irish, German, Italian, Polish, and English.

The most common language spoken in Buffalo is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and African languages.