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Demographics of Ridgewood, NJ
Affluence Level in Ridgewood, NJ
A wealthy area with high-earning, well-educated households. Incomes, home values, and educational attainment meaningfully outpace national averages.
People of Ridgewood, NJ
Ridgewood, New Jersey, is a densely settled village of 26,076 residents that blends old-money prestige with a growing professional-class diversity. The population is notably well-educated — 80.6% hold a college degree — and remains predominantly white (67.1%), but the village has absorbed significant East/Southeast Asian (12.0%) and Indian-subcontinent (4.4%) communities since the 1990s. Its character is defined by a walkable downtown, top-ranked public schools, and a commuter culture oriented toward New York City, making it a magnet for high-income families who prioritize education and community stability.
How the city was settled and grew
Ridgewood’s original European settlers were Dutch and English farmers who arrived in the late 17th century, drawn by the fertile valley of the Saddle River. The village remained a rural hamlet until the arrival of the Erie Railroad in the 1840s, which transformed it into a commuter suburb for New York City’s growing merchant and professional classes. By the early 1900s, Ridgewood was being marketed as a “country village” for wealthy families, and its historic core — the Hudson Street and East Ridgewood Avenue corridors — filled with Victorian and Colonial Revival homes built by German, Irish, and Italian craftsmen. The Maple Park and Sheridan Heights neighborhoods, developed between 1900 and 1930, became the strongholds of these European-immigrant families, many of whom worked as tradesmen or small business owners. The village’s population grew steadily through the mid-20th century, peaking at roughly 28,000 in 1970, as second- and third-generation descendants of these groups settled into stable, middle-class life.
Modern era (post-1965)
The 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act opened the door for new waves of migration that reshaped Ridgewood’s ethnic map. The most visible change came from East/Southeast Asian families — primarily Chinese, Korean, and Taiwanese — who began arriving in the 1980s and 1990s, drawn by the village’s school system and safe streets. These households concentrated in the Ridgewood Heights and Willard School zones, where larger homes and newer subdivisions offered space for multigenerational living. Indian-subcontinent families (Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi) followed a similar pattern, clustering in the Orchard Street and Glenwood Avenue areas near the village’s southern edge. Hispanic residents, now 10.2% of the population, are a more dispersed group, with many working in service and landscaping jobs; they are most visible in the Hillside Avenue corridor and the older apartment stock near the train station. The Black population (2.2%) remains small and largely concentrated in the Franklin Turnpike area, reflecting Ridgewood’s historic lack of affordable housing and exclusionary zoning. Since 2000, the white share has declined from roughly 80% to 67%, while the Asian and Indian shares have doubled, driven by professional-class migration from New York City and direct immigration from China, South Korea, and India.
The future
Ridgewood’s population is trending toward greater ethnic diversity, but the change is gradual and concentrated in specific enclaves rather than producing a fully integrated mix. The East/Southeast Asian and Indian communities are growing through chain migration and high birth rates, and they are likely to reach 20% and 8% of the population, respectively, by 2040. These groups are also assimilating rapidly — second-generation children attend Ridgewood High School and enter the same professional tracks as their white peers. The Hispanic population is growing more slowly, constrained by housing costs that push many families to nearby Paramus or Hackensack. The white population is aging and declining in absolute numbers, as younger white families are priced out by rising home values. The village is not tribalizing into hostile enclaves, but it is sorting by income and school zone: the highest-priced homes in Sheridan Heights and Maple Park remain overwhelmingly white, while the Willard School zone is now majority Asian and Indian. The next decade will likely see Ridgewood become a majority-minority village in its elementary schools, even as its adult population remains majority white.
For a conservative-leaning family or individual moving to Ridgewood now, the village offers a stable, high-achieving environment where property values and school rankings are likely to hold. The demographic shifts are real but orderly — driven by professional ambition rather than displacement — and the village’s institutions (schools, village council, civic groups) remain dominated by long-term white residents. The bottom line: Ridgewood is becoming a more diverse, more expensive version of its former self, and newcomers of any background who can afford the entry price will find a community that rewards education, order, and civic engagement.
* Values derived from national, state, county, city and local statistics and may differ in a specific area. Last updated: 2026-04-30T03:16:54.000Z
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