Notoriously cramped NYC apartments are actually getting larger in 1 borough
Renters chasing extra elbow room in New York City have exactly one borough to thank. Queens is the sole district where new apartments have grown over the past decade, according to a fresh analysis from RentCafe that tracked square footage across the 100 largest cities in the country.What’s more, Queens lands at fifth nationally for the biggest gains in living space during that span of time.The typical new Queens apartment now clocks in at 732 square feet, a 16-square-foot bump from where things stood a decade ago. That’s part of a broader national trend, with the average US apartment now sitting at 910 square feet after every unit type picked up extra space in 2025. Queens’ growth outpaced the national gain of 13 square feet, even as the borough still ranks in the bottom tier for overall size compared to the rest of the country.Brooklyn and Manhattan did not fare nearly as well. Brooklyn ranks fourth among the country’s smallest markets, with apartments averaging 714 square feet, 6 square feet smaller than a decade ago. Manhattan landed just behind at 735 square feet with sizes barely budging since 2016.Both boroughs are getting squeezed by the same forces reshaping cramped cities everywhere.Developers are leaning hard into studios and one-bedrooms because they can pack more units into a single building, a strategy that drives down the average square footage even as it puts more apartments on the market. “When we see average apartment sizes decrease in a city, it doesn’t necessarily mean renters are getting less value,” RentCafe research analyst Veronica Grecu said in the report. “In high-demand markets, developers often prioritize studios and one-bedrooms because they can deliver more apartments per building and meet the needs of a growing number of single-person and smaller households,” she added.
“The trade-off is a lower average square footage, but the upside is more availability in markets where inventory has historically been tight....