Illinois

Illinois is the sixth-most-populous state, with 12.6 million residents across 57,914 square miles — the most populous state in the Midwest, driven almost entirely by Chicago, the third-largest city in the country. Springfield is the capital, but Chicago (2.7 million; metro 9.5 million) dwarfs every other city in the state, followed by Aurora, Joliet, Rockford, and Naperville.

Illinois is "The Land of Lincoln" — Abraham Lincoln lived in Springfield from 1837 until he left for Washington in 1861, and is buried there. Geographically, the state is overwhelmingly flat, glaciated by the Wisconsin ice sheet into the Illinois Till Plain, whose deep, dark loam soils are among the most productive farmland on Earth — Illinois consistently ranks first or second nationally in both corn and soybean production. The Mississippi River forms the entire western border, the Ohio River the southern border, and the only real relief in the state is the unglaciated Shawnee Hills in the far south and the Driftless Area hills around Galena in the far northwest.

Illinois has one of the most diversified economies of any Midwestern state: Chicago is the world capital of futures and derivatives trading through the CME Group and CBOE, and the state is headquarters to Boeing, McDonald's, Caterpillar, Deere & Company, and Abbott, among many other Fortune 500 companies. That said, Illinois also carries one of the most severe public pension crises of any state, with unfunded liabilities exceeding $200 billion — a fiscal strain that has contributed to real population outmigration even as Chicago itself remains a global city.

Illinois is one of the flattest states in the country — its high point, Charles Mound (1,235 ft) in the far northwest corner, is a modest glacial till hill accessible only when the private landowner opens it on summer weekends, and even Wisconsin, Iowa, and Missouri all have higher points. The real story of Illinois topography is at its edges rather than in a single summit: the Driftless Area around Galena escaped the last glaciation entirely and keeps a genuinely rugged, unglaciated character, while the Shawnee Hills in the far south rise 900-1,000 feet above the surrounding river lowlands.

Starved Rock State Park

Starved Rock, on the Illinois River west of Chicago, is by far the state's most popular natural attraction, drawing more than 2 million visitors a year to its 18 sandstone canyons — St. Louis Canyon's 40-foot waterfall into a grotto is the most dramatic, with French Canyon's mossy, narrow walls and Wildcat Canyon's spring wildflowers rounding out the classic loop. The canyons run strongest in April and freeze into genuine ice formations in January; the adjacent Matthiessen State Park offers a quieter, less-crowded version of the same sandstone-dells landscape.

The Shawnee Hills

In the far south, Shawnee National Forest holds Illinois's wildest country. Garden of the Gods' wind-sculpted sandstone formations — Camel Rock, Anvil Rock — rise above the forest canopy and give one of the state's few genuinely elevated views; Giant City State Park's "streets," narrow passages between house-sized boulders, are the quintessential southern Illinois hike, cool and moss-covered even in summer; and Bell Smith Springs adds natural bridges and clear spring-fed swimming holes to the mix. Burden Falls and Jackson Falls, both modest sandstone cascades, round out a region that feels almost nothing like the prairie stereotype most people associate with Illinois.

Rivers, Bluffs, and the Lakefront

Along the Mississippi, Mississippi Palisades State Park near Savanna gives 200-foot limestone bluff views over the river, and Pere Marquette State Park overlooks the dramatic confluence where the Illinois River meets the Mississippi at Grafton — both are prime bald eagle watching spots each winter, when eagles gather below the lock-and-dam open water. In Chicago itself, 26 miles of Lake Michigan lakefront are entirely public land, a legacy of 19th-century litigation establishing the "forever open, clear, and free" principle, with the 18-mile Lakefront Trail among the most heavily used multi-use paths in the country.

About 65% of all Illinoisans live in the Chicago metro, creating a sharp urban-rural divide between the state's cosmopolitan core and its predominantly agricultural interior.

Chicago

Chicago (2.7 million; metro 9.5 million), the third-largest city in the US, is a global center of finance, architecture, and culture — the skyscraper itself was invented here (the Home Insurance Building, 1885), and the city's grid plan became the template referenced across American urban planning. Chicago is the hub of the entire US rail system, with more lines converging there than in any other city, and O'Hare is the second-busiest airport in the country. The city's blues and jazz heritage and its distinct neighborhoods — Wicker Park, Hyde Park, Pilsen, Bronzeville — give it cultural depth well beyond its financial reputation.

The Suburbs and Secondary Cities

Naperville, a Chicago western suburb, is consistently ranked among the wealthiest and most livable cities in the country, built around an excellent downtown riverwalk. Aurora, the state's second-largest city, sits 35 miles west of Chicago on the Fox River, and Rockford, the largest non-Chicago city in the north, has transitioned from a manufacturing base toward healthcare and aviation. Joliet, on the Des Plaines River, carries genuine Route 66 heritage alongside one of the finest surviving movie palaces in the country, the Rialto Square Theatre.

Downstate and Historic Cities

Springfield, the capital, concentrates a remarkable density of Lincoln history in a city of just 114,000 — his home, his tomb, and the Old State Capitol where he delivered the "House Divided" speech. Galena, an 1850s lead-mining boomtown where 85% of buildings predate 1870, is arguably the best-preserved 19th-century town in the entire Midwest. Peoria, the Illinois River city midway between Chicago and St. Louis, gave rise to the phrase "will it play in Peoria" as shorthand for middle-American acceptance, and Bloomington-Normal is home to both Illinois State University and the headquarters of State Farm, the largest home and auto insurer in the country.

The Economy

Illinois has the fifth-largest GDP of any state, powered by Chicago's role as the world capital of futures and derivatives trading through the CME Group and CBOE, alongside a genuinely diversified base of agriculture (Illinois ranks first or second nationally in both corn and soybeans), manufacturing (Caterpillar, Deere & Company, the Illinois-Indiana steel corridor), and a growing fintech and startup scene. The state's severe public pension crisis — more than $200 billion in unfunded liabilities — and some of the highest property tax rates in the country remain a persistent drag against that economic strength.

Illinois has one of the richest higher-education ecosystems in the country. The University of Chicago, consistently ranked among the top five universities in the world, has produced more Nobel laureates in economics than any other institution and hosted Enrico Fermi's first controlled nuclear reaction in 1942, beneath the stands of Stagg Field. Northwestern University, in Evanston, pairs a top-15 national ranking with a particularly strong journalism school (Medill) and a genuinely beautiful lakefront campus. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the flagship public research university, is consistently ranked first or second nationally in computer science — the Mosaic browser, the predecessor to Netscape and arguably the first modern web browser, was developed there in 1992.

At the high school level, New Trier Township High School in Winnetka is consistently ranked the top public high school in Illinois and among the best in the country, serving the affluent North Shore suburbs with more than 300 course offerings. The Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, a state-funded residential school in Aurora, accepts roughly 650 gifted students a year from across the state for original faculty-mentored research, and Walter Payton College Prep leads Chicago Public Schools' selective-enrollment magnet system.

Illinois's visitor experience splits cleanly between Chicago's world-class urban attractions and the Lincoln and river history scattered across the rest of the state.

Chicago's Landmarks

Millennium Park's Cloud Gate — the reflective "Bean" sculpture — has become one of the most photographed public artworks in the world since its 2006 installation, and the adjacent Art Institute of Chicago ranks among the finest art museums anywhere. The Museum Campus groups the Field Museum, the Shedd Aquarium (the most-visited aquarium in the world), and the Adler Planetarium along the lakefront, and the Chicago Architecture Center's river boat tour is widely considered the best urban architecture experience in the country — fitting, given the city invented the skyscraper.

Lincoln Country and Historic Towns

Springfield's Lincoln sites — his only owned home, his tomb, the Old State Capitol — make it the country's preeminent Lincoln heritage destination, and nearby New Salem State Historic Site is a fully reconstructed 1830s village where Lincoln came of age between ages 22 and 28. Cahokia Mounds, near St. Louis, was the largest pre-Columbian city north of Mexico, home to 10,000-20,000 people around 1100 CE and anchored by Monks Mound, the largest prehistoric earthwork in North America — a UNESCO World Heritage Site today.

Road Trips and Family Weekends

Illinois holds the original starting stretch of Route 66, 300 miles from Chicago through Pontiac, Bloomington, and Springfield to St. Louis — widely considered the best-preserved and most culturally rich state section of the entire highway. For families, Chicago's Museum Campus and the Brookfield Zoo (one of the first in the country to display animals in open habitats rather than cages) anchor a strong weekend, while Starved Rock's short, well-marked canyon trails work well for children as young as five, especially paired with the winter eagle-watching boat tours on the Illinois River.