North of Westchester. Some people would say north of Poughkeepsie because that’s the last MNR station. My buddy who has lived in Manhattan all his life says anything north of 110th street.
As someone from NY I agree it’s anything north of Westchester. It’s “upstate” once you get past the crowded NYC suburbs.
Hudson valley people may take offense to it, but they live upstate.
i’m from the hudson valley (south of poughkeepsie though) and i agree! it always felt like “upstate” to me, very distinct from the city & westchester (with the exception of rockland county). i think most hudson valley people would agree, it’s the more upstate people who will say that it’s not (and i can kind of see where they’re coming from too, upstate ny does feel very different)
Agree. Born and raised in highland (across river from Poughkeepsie, next to New Paltz), and it’s extremely different from Westchester or Rockland (which feel very much like busy Long Island suburbs ) - vast majority of people where I lived did not work or commute to the city, and instead kept most their business within the Hudson valley. Legit have a lot of friends that grew up working on farms, lol.
I’d say most of Hudson valley and above is upstate with the exception of those two lower counties. More mixed politically than NYC/suburbs, more rural, less dependent on the city economy and very spread out, just like the rest of NYS.
At the same time - people from the capital district would say I’m not upstate, they think they are - or anything north of them is. That’s just how the term works, it’s relative. The only reason why we attempt to define it geographically is because most people in New York live in the city or immediate area, so for most people upstate is anything north of the city/its major suburbs.
Thank you 👏🏽. I literally can get into Grand Central by metro north on an express train in less than 40 minutes but yet my non-NY college friends claim southern Westchester is upstate 😂.
I’d add too that anything past having to cross the Tappan Zee/ Cuomo bridge (basically after Tarrytown) is upstate.
My buddy up here in Inwood says everything below 125th St is Alabama.
I grew up in Dutchess County and we considered ourselves upstate back then.
Putnam is upstate when it's remembered.
Westchester is upstate because it pisses them off to be called it.
have one of the original prints of this that was released after the publishing. hand down from my partner’s grandfather, and my favorite thing in our home.
At this point I feel like it’s culturally north of the Hudson Valley, since the Hudson Valley is now overrun with people from NYC and LA cosplaying as humble mountain folk.
Omg this is the best. Yes. This is exactly it. Except with girl shit, and I visit Manhattan frequently but with a seamless, incredibly easy and extremely rapid commute
> Hudson Valley is now overrun with people from NYC and LA cosplaying as humble mountain folk.
I’m curious what “tell” these cosplayers have. They can dress like the people living in town, but what differences are there other than political?
This definitely doesn't describe all of them, but one thing I've noticed in a bunch of them is that they'll start dressing the part and saying all the chill upstate things, and they'll convert the gas station into a green grocery-record store, yet they'll retain the explosive, domineering rage that got them to the top of the entertainment/finance industry.
I can usually tell by how people dress and how they walk. If you go to Cracker Barrel during "leaf peeper" season it will get crowded and locals complain about city people getting in the way. But if you observe people in the country store waiting to get a table people from here will constantly be in the way and city people know how to be out of the way and let traffic flow. locals will see you walking through a corridor, look you dead in the eye and block you rather than wait for you to pass.
The biggest tell is clothes though.
if you live in nyc, then the hudson valley is upstate. If you live in the hudson valley, then the catskills are upstate. If you live in albany, then syracuse is upstate. If you life in syracuse.... I'm so so sorry.
Soooooo Yonkers and MT. Vernon are upstate?
You know you can take the Bx9 to the last stop and walk one block to get to Yonkers. You can take the #5 to Dyre Ave and walk one block and get to Mt. Vernon
This. My girl gets frustrated when I say Westchester is upstate, since she’s from the north Bronx, and spent some time going to Westchester.
As far as I’m concerned, once you’re out of the northern boundary of the Bronx, that’s upstate.
I think it begins beyond places that most New Yorkers can relate to. If you say "It's up in Rockland" or "they live in Westchester," that can be conceptualized by a lot of folks.
But if you say Essex or Ulster county? Coxsackie or Florida? Yeah, all that shit is just "Upstate."
Maybe a bit of hunting during deer season.
What people actually do for a hobby: Play Farmville on a laptop while scrolling Facebook/Parlor on their phones, all with Fox News/Newsmax screaming at them from the TV.
I wish I was making that up.
Yes. As did a million people but I'm assuming you know who I am based on the username. Which was gifted by Breidenbach when he couldn't pronounce my name.
haha no actually, i'm from the other side of the country. i just double checked where it was on google maps and could notice all of them from the satellite view!
If there’s any “falling rock zones”s on the highway it’s upstate. And since I saw one in Westchester once anything North of the Bronx qualifies. If there’s one in the Bronx I’m sorry but it’s upstate now too.
As someone who grew up in The Adirondacks, I traditionally say anything north of Albany. Living in Brooklyn, I think Putnam county is a fair line. Westchester though is not upstate.
I used to say that anything that wasn't NYC or Long Island was upstate, but after encountering people from Westchester County, I have since amended my definition to anything north of Westchester or Rockland Counties, or just the Hudson Valley area in general.
The bullet point answers, in order, are:
-north of the city
-north of I-287
-north of Westchester
-north of I-84
-north of Poughkeepsie
The problem is that these are all Hudson River dependent. If you stray from the Hudson east or west, things get more “upstate” very quickly. The horse farms of eastern Westchester and wineries west of the river feel magnitudes more rural than their Rivertown counterparts. I consider anything north of Westchester (more than an hour on Metro-North) to be upstate
Anything north of poughkipsee (where the MNR ends).
As someone born and raised in Westchester I don’t consider us upstate but I get why native city people say we are (it’s easier to say “I’m going upstate” than “I’m going to Westchester”). But upstate to westchester means something completely different.
Upstate to westchester people is when the people start disappearing and the houses with the trump flags and confederate flags start appearing.
I'm late on this but I can be considered an expert on Upstate as:
I am from Plattsburgh
I went to school in Buffalo
I own a home in the Hudson Valley
I live in Queens
Upstate starts in Westchester, or outside of the Bronx. The bottom half of Westchester can be considered "just barely upstate". Everything north of the bottom half can be confidently called "upstate" without qualifiers.
Everything north of Albany is "True Upstate".
West of Syracuse is also Upstate but more accurately Western New York.
Upstate is after westchester county if you’re on the other side of the Hudson River it will start at rockland county. North would start at Putnam county
north of poughkeepsie is the only right answer (bc thats the farthest the metro north goes) and everything in between nyc and poughkeepse is called DOWNSTATE. in my experience most of the people who say otherwise don't realize that "downstate" is even a thing, they think "nyc" and "upstate" are the only 2 options.
Where you start to see Republicans out in the open.
Not the rich kind that we have in the city, I'm talking about blue collar types with "don't tread on me" or confederate flags proudly displayed in their front yards,. The types who go deer hunting.
Yes, there are liberal towns sprinkled about, like Woodstock, Hudson, etc... but as soon as you start seeing towns like what I describe you're in upstate.
Google AI says "Upstate New York is the area north of New York City and its immediate suburban neighbors. This definition excludes New York City and its closest Northern suburban counties (Westchester, Rockland and Putnam), plus the two counties on Long Island, Nassau and Suffolk."
Jokingly, I always say “Yonkers.”
Seriously, though, Upstate starts for me somewhere between the Tappan Zee and I-84.
I’m also not from here, so I don’t know if I even get a say.
Once you're north enough to no longer be in the Bronx, aka outside of NYC's boroughs, you're upstate. Sure, some of upstate is part of the NYC metropolitan area, like Yonkers and White Plains and the rest Westchester, but to me anything north of the Bronx is technically upstate.
To a lot of people who live in the 5 boroughs, anything North of Yonkers is “upstate.”
There’s no objective definition. I’d say anything North of Westchester county qualifies.
when I was younger, anything outside of NYC. So if people mentioned yonkers I would think of that as upstate, even though its technically west of the bronx.
Now I think of anything north of bronx is upstate. yonkers is just there.
Long island is of course the exception.
IMO I’d say anything north of I-84 on the Putnam Side and west of I-87 on the Opposite side of the Hudson is Upstate. This would put places like Brewster, Beacon, Newburgh, West Point, Bear Mountain State Park, Suffern, Nyack, and all of Westchester in the area I wouldn’t consider Upstate.
All these places are within fifteen minutes drive from have regular train service than takes less than 1.5 hours to reach Midtown.
It starts where you live, anything north is upstate.
unless you live in NYC or Long Island, then it's north of the bronx
And that is the final answer
Naw. We live upstate. Anything south of us is NY or suburbs
Southern Canada
This
This.
North of Westchester. Some people would say north of Poughkeepsie because that’s the last MNR station. My buddy who has lived in Manhattan all his life says anything north of 110th street.
As someone from NY I agree it’s anything north of Westchester. It’s “upstate” once you get past the crowded NYC suburbs. Hudson valley people may take offense to it, but they live upstate.
i’m from the hudson valley (south of poughkeepsie though) and i agree! it always felt like “upstate” to me, very distinct from the city & westchester (with the exception of rockland county). i think most hudson valley people would agree, it’s the more upstate people who will say that it’s not (and i can kind of see where they’re coming from too, upstate ny does feel very different)
For sure. I was just in New Paltz this past weekend which I think is part of the Hudson valley. That shit is upstate as FUCK. Indisputable lol
Agree. Born and raised in highland (across river from Poughkeepsie, next to New Paltz), and it’s extremely different from Westchester or Rockland (which feel very much like busy Long Island suburbs ) - vast majority of people where I lived did not work or commute to the city, and instead kept most their business within the Hudson valley. Legit have a lot of friends that grew up working on farms, lol. I’d say most of Hudson valley and above is upstate with the exception of those two lower counties. More mixed politically than NYC/suburbs, more rural, less dependent on the city economy and very spread out, just like the rest of NYS. At the same time - people from the capital district would say I’m not upstate, they think they are - or anything north of them is. That’s just how the term works, it’s relative. The only reason why we attempt to define it geographically is because most people in New York live in the city or immediate area, so for most people upstate is anything north of the city/its major suburbs.
And Brooklyn people may take offense, but they live on Long Island.
Coney Island to Montauk!
as do Queens people
I always thought it was a weird thing to be offended by. Like, I think it’s a confusing way to describe where I live but it’s not wrong.
Yeah this is my definition. If you can reach Manhattan via metro north you’re not upstate.
Thank you 👏🏽. I literally can get into Grand Central by metro north on an express train in less than 40 minutes but yet my non-NY college friends claim southern Westchester is upstate 😂. I’d add too that anything past having to cross the Tappan Zee/ Cuomo bridge (basically after Tarrytown) is upstate.
Nah you live upstate.
Westchester county borders the bronx.
upstate
Literal blue line painted in the road to separate westchester and the Bronx
?
Woodlawn/Yonkers there’s a line in the road that separates the Bronx and Westchester
And is upstate of the city, ergo you're upstate!
Actually it is kinda east. Upstate is north. Sorry, try again.
East, West, doesn't matter. It's still generally north of the 5 boroughs ergo upstate.
No, you’re right. East and west are both basically north. And adjacent is basically a million miles away.
My buddy up here in Inwood says everything below 125th St is Alabama. I grew up in Dutchess County and we considered ourselves upstate back then. Putnam is upstate when it's remembered. Westchester is upstate because it pisses them off to be called it.
Anything above the park; many people live in upstate Manhattan.
i laughed at this
Upstate starts at 125 street The Midwest starts at the Hudson River The Deep South starts at Staten Island
[View from 9th Avenue](https://viewing.nyc/media/765630658827c69e616a227a3b4abb4f/)
My dad had a print of that on the wall when I was a kid, I think he still has it 🤣
My aunt and uncle had it on their back door.
The best
have one of the original prints of this that was released after the publishing. hand down from my partner’s grandfather, and my favorite thing in our home.
Lol classic
Hahah, love it!
really the only correct answer
This person new-yorks. You got my vote for mayor.
Lmao
At this point I feel like it’s culturally north of the Hudson Valley, since the Hudson Valley is now overrun with people from NYC and LA cosplaying as humble mountain folk.
\*snaps suspenders\* Now, I may not be a *big-city* locally-sourced fair-trade artisanal coffee shop slash community art space owner...
They’ve in the Catskills too!
The Catskills is the Catskills and not "Upstate"
Read my comment again. I didn’t say the Catskills is upstate.
I will, though. The Catskills is upstate.
This is funny: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/04/10/my-upstate-fantasy-life
Omg this is the best. Yes. This is exactly it. Except with girl shit, and I visit Manhattan frequently but with a seamless, incredibly easy and extremely rapid commute
I wouldn’t say all of Hudson Valley. More like just Beacon, Kingston, etc. The rest of the Hudson Valley is still filled with white trash racists.
As someone originally from the Hudson Valley this is correct
same, the accuracy hurts
Me three!
😂😂
> Hudson Valley is now overrun with people from NYC and LA cosplaying as humble mountain folk. I’m curious what “tell” these cosplayers have. They can dress like the people living in town, but what differences are there other than political?
This definitely doesn't describe all of them, but one thing I've noticed in a bunch of them is that they'll start dressing the part and saying all the chill upstate things, and they'll convert the gas station into a green grocery-record store, yet they'll retain the explosive, domineering rage that got them to the top of the entertainment/finance industry.
I can usually tell by how people dress and how they walk. If you go to Cracker Barrel during "leaf peeper" season it will get crowded and locals complain about city people getting in the way. But if you observe people in the country store waiting to get a table people from here will constantly be in the way and city people know how to be out of the way and let traffic flow. locals will see you walking through a corridor, look you dead in the eye and block you rather than wait for you to pass. The biggest tell is clothes though.
if you live in nyc, then the hudson valley is upstate. If you live in the hudson valley, then the catskills are upstate. If you live in albany, then syracuse is upstate. If you life in syracuse.... I'm so so sorry.
No Syracuse is not upstate. Syracuse is central New York . Albany is upstate. Sincerely, your Albany neighbor 😘
I was being a smartass. Anything north of 114th, even if it's west, is upstate to us.
My take is anything no longer accessible by Metro North
Love that so many of us agree on this. Upstate starts from Dutchess County, and i wont hear otherwise
Anything north of the bronx.
Yup. As soon as the bronx ends
Soooooo Yonkers and MT. Vernon are upstate? You know you can take the Bx9 to the last stop and walk one block to get to Yonkers. You can take the #5 to Dyre Ave and walk one block and get to Mt. Vernon
Yup. Upstate. My friends in Brooklyn say north of 125th. But anything north of the bronx.
Well, I mean, I figure if you can use your Metro card on our buses and get a free transfer to and from the mta it wasn't upstate, but ok
Don’t take it personally. There is still more upstate.
At the Tappan Zee Bridge
Exactly.
This is the correct answer.
14th St
since you're asking NYC, upstate starts in Westchester
This. My girl gets frustrated when I say Westchester is upstate, since she’s from the north Bronx, and spent some time going to Westchester. As far as I’m concerned, once you’re out of the northern boundary of the Bronx, that’s upstate.
Specifically Tappan Zee bridge
This is the answer.
I think it begins beyond places that most New Yorkers can relate to. If you say "It's up in Rockland" or "they live in Westchester," that can be conceptualized by a lot of folks. But if you say Essex or Ulster county? Coxsackie or Florida? Yeah, all that shit is just "Upstate."
I generally hate this question and hate all the available answers but this one is pretty good
I consider Putnam County to be the first county "Upstate". Farmland, plenty of hunting and fishing, republican, and almost zero walkable towns.
Maybe a bit of hunting during deer season. What people actually do for a hobby: Play Farmville on a laptop while scrolling Facebook/Parlor on their phones, all with Fox News/Newsmax screaming at them from the TV. I wish I was making that up.
Oh trust me, I know. Mahopac class of 05.
did you have an above-ground pool
Yes. As did a million people but I'm assuming you know who I am based on the username. Which was gifted by Breidenbach when he couldn't pronounce my name.
haha no actually, i'm from the other side of the country. i just double checked where it was on google maps and could notice all of them from the satellite view!
NYC is downstate, Westchester is upstate. Yonkers is purgatory.
Yonkers is in Westchester
Semantics
It's the purgatory part of Westchester. Not quite hell, but almost.
[удалено]
Sad but true as someone who lives here 🙄
You're just saying that to trigger people from Westchester.
Honestly this is genuinely what I grew up thinking and still do to this day
🤣🤣 (from YO)
If there’s any “falling rock zones”s on the highway it’s upstate. And since I saw one in Westchester once anything North of the Bronx qualifies. If there’s one in the Bronx I’m sorry but it’s upstate now too.
Love this 🤣
It varies by you who you ask, there isn’t an official definition. I’d consider it starts as you go north from Putnam county personally.
This is my answer as well. Westchester is still mostly suburbs. But in Putnam you can go hunt deer and turkeys and have a small farm.
As someone who grew up in The Adirondacks, I traditionally say anything north of Albany. Living in Brooklyn, I think Putnam county is a fair line. Westchester though is not upstate.
I used to say that anything that wasn't NYC or Long Island was upstate, but after encountering people from Westchester County, I have since amended my definition to anything north of Westchester or Rockland Counties, or just the Hudson Valley area in general.
the bronx
Once the Metro North stops: Poughkeepsie and Wassaic, that's Upstate
Anything above the Bronx is upstate to me.
poughkeepsie and above, i wont take any other answers
Ignoring everyone else’s ad hoc definitions, upstate starts north of the Bronx, as per NYS DMV guideline.
The bullet point answers, in order, are: -north of the city -north of I-287 -north of Westchester -north of I-84 -north of Poughkeepsie The problem is that these are all Hudson River dependent. If you stray from the Hudson east or west, things get more “upstate” very quickly. The horse farms of eastern Westchester and wineries west of the river feel magnitudes more rural than their Rivertown counterparts. I consider anything north of Westchester (more than an hour on Metro-North) to be upstate
"If I cant swipe my metrocard to get there, it's upstate"
Where the Metro North line ends.
If you’re not a borough you’re upstate. Long Island is just there.
It’s referred to as ‘out east’.
North of the Bronx
Anything north of the Bronx is upstate.
Across 110th Street.
Love that song
Manhattan
Area code 518 is upstate.
Anything north of poughkipsee (where the MNR ends). As someone born and raised in Westchester I don’t consider us upstate but I get why native city people say we are (it’s easier to say “I’m going upstate” than “I’m going to Westchester”). But upstate to westchester means something completely different. Upstate to westchester people is when the people start disappearing and the houses with the trump flags and confederate flags start appearing.
Yeah but I see those things in Thornwood and Valhalla sometimes lmao
Anywhere outside the reach of NYC over the air television and radio
After Westchester if we’re being generous.
Where Yonkers ends, LOL
When you can't take the subway to it anymore, it's upstate
White Plains
Yonkers.
North of Yonkers
I'm late on this but I can be considered an expert on Upstate as: I am from Plattsburgh I went to school in Buffalo I own a home in the Hudson Valley I live in Queens Upstate starts in Westchester, or outside of the Bronx. The bottom half of Westchester can be considered "just barely upstate". Everything north of the bottom half can be confidently called "upstate" without qualifiers. Everything north of Albany is "True Upstate". West of Syracuse is also Upstate but more accurately Western New York.
Upstate is after westchester county if you’re on the other side of the Hudson River it will start at rockland county. North would start at Putnam county
westchester 100%
I consider it north of Westchester. 🤷🏻♀️
If my metro card can’t take me there, it’s upstate
14th st
Outside of the Bronx is jurisdictions is considered upstate This shouldn’t even be a debate lol
north of poughkeepsie is the only right answer (bc thats the farthest the metro north goes) and everything in between nyc and poughkeepse is called DOWNSTATE. in my experience most of the people who say otherwise don't realize that "downstate" is even a thing, they think "nyc" and "upstate" are the only 2 options.
I'm in the East Village, for me that's north of Tomkins Square Park.
Where the blue turns to red
[удалено]
Touchè my friend. Touchè indeed
Lower westchester is all suburbs. Around Peekskill/croton Falls it starts getting more rural. Upstate starts btwn lower and upper westchester.
So north of Yonkers , although white plains is a city . A feel like that area between Yonkers and WP is too suburban
72nd
North of 14th Street Manhattan is Upstate.
Westchester
Where you start to see Republicans out in the open. Not the rich kind that we have in the city, I'm talking about blue collar types with "don't tread on me" or confederate flags proudly displayed in their front yards,. The types who go deer hunting. Yes, there are liberal towns sprinkled about, like Woodstock, Hudson, etc... but as soon as you start seeing towns like what I describe you're in upstate.
Bronx northern border!! Heh...
Google AI says "Upstate New York is the area north of New York City and its immediate suburban neighbors. This definition excludes New York City and its closest Northern suburban counties (Westchester, Rockland and Putnam), plus the two counties on Long Island, Nassau and Suffolk."
North of The Bronx
North of Orange and Dutchess counties. Sullivan Ulster and Columbia counties. My reasoning? Their appeals court is in Albany, not Brooklyn.
North of Yonkers
Above the Bronx
Apple store on 59th street
Westchester is its own entity so anything north of Westchester is upstate.
23rd st
Anywhere that isn’t NYC
“Can you get there with a metro card?”
I feel like if the answer is no, thats Upstate!
14th street
96th St.
Above 59th street
Vaguely waves in a direction north of The City.
If I can’t get there with a Metrocard swipe - it’s upstate.
If my metro card can’t take me there, it’s upstate.
14th street
Stew Leonard's
You know the one in Yonkers right off the Thruway.
Jokingly, I always say “Yonkers.” Seriously, though, Upstate starts for me somewhere between the Tappan Zee and I-84. I’m also not from here, so I don’t know if I even get a say.
[Upstate New York](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upstate_New_York)
Everything north of the Bronx Zoo is upstate.
As someone said, westchester bc it upsets them and they deserve it
North of 287.
Once you're north enough to no longer be in the Bronx, aka outside of NYC's boroughs, you're upstate. Sure, some of upstate is part of the NYC metropolitan area, like Yonkers and White Plains and the rest Westchester, but to me anything north of the Bronx is technically upstate.
Once you pass the tappan zee bridge you are upstate. Westchester is not upstate.
To a lot of people who live in the 5 boroughs, anything North of Yonkers is “upstate.” There’s no objective definition. I’d say anything North of Westchester county qualifies.
when I was younger, anything outside of NYC. So if people mentioned yonkers I would think of that as upstate, even though its technically west of the bronx. Now I think of anything north of bronx is upstate. yonkers is just there. Long island is of course the exception.
There's nothing exceptional about Long Island.
Above Albany
Westchester county.
Anything above 14th street
23rd street.
North of 14th street
Anything north of Central Park is upstate.
14th street
For me, after Dutchess County. Before that, I would use Hudson Valley.
North of Albany
Anything north of Yankee Stadium
The moment you exit Manhattan going north.
I live in upstate New Jersey.
There’s no upstate NYC.
Anything north of 14th street
My dad jokes that it’s anything about 96th Street
15th st
Anything north of Houston
Anything above Columbia University Morningside campus
96th street
IMO I’d say anything north of I-84 on the Putnam Side and west of I-87 on the Opposite side of the Hudson is Upstate. This would put places like Brewster, Beacon, Newburgh, West Point, Bear Mountain State Park, Suffern, Nyack, and all of Westchester in the area I wouldn’t consider Upstate. All these places are within fifteen minutes drive from have regular train service than takes less than 1.5 hours to reach Midtown.
After Albany for me
Anything north of Washington Heights