A city of 53,569, settled in 1865. Home to Illinois State University.
The 3 things Normal does most differently from other towns.
1880 · 1940 Census Enumeration District Maps -…12 postcards, papers and photographs from public archives, and 8 places on the National Register.
2 colleges in town.
What neighbors are saying. Town Square →
Nothing on the calendar.
Ordered by what stands out in Normal. Another town gets a different order.
About one in 4 of Normal’s working residents works in town. The top destinations are Bloomington (35%), Peoria (4%) and Chicago (3%). Half commute less than 4 miles.
The median sale price was $283,000 in May 2026.
9.7 miles of trails across 23 parks and preserves.
| Biggest places to walk | Trails | Acres |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Maxwell Park | 3.3 mi | 125 |
| 2. Ilse and Charles Jobson Natural Play Park | 0.6 mi | 11 |
| 3. Fairview Park | 0.3 mi | 49 |
Normal beats the Illinois average on 9 of 32 CDC measures and trails it on 8.
| What stands out | Normal | IL |
|---|---|---|
| Fewer adults with diabetes | 8% | 11.7% |
| Fewer adults who have had a stroke | 2.4% | 3.3% |
| More adults without reliable transportation | 11.7% | 8% |
Normal reports more crime per resident than most U.S. towns we grade: about 68% report less.
Normal has chilly winters and warm summers. A typical July afternoon reaches 85°, a January night drops to 17°, and about 7 inches of snow falls in a normal winter.
Expected storm and flood damage is higher than in 49% of U.S. communities.
1914
Illinois State Normal University
Photo · Library of Congress. A different picture from Normal’s archive appears here every day.
See all 12 archive items →8 places in Normal on the National Register of Historic Places.
33 notable people were born in Normal.
Town in the United States
Normal is a town in McLean County, Illinois, United States. The population was 52,736 at the 2020 census. Normal is the smaller of the two principal cities of the Bloomington–Normal metropolitan area, and is Illinois's seventh most populous community outside the Chicago metropolitan area. It is home to Illinois State University and Heartland Community College. Founded in 1865, it was renamed Normal in 1867 after Illinois State Normal University (now Illinois State University), a normal school. Chris Koos has been the mayor of Normal since 2003.
From Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 · facts via Wikidata (CC0)
4 towns share a border with Normal.
