How census tracts qualify for the 2027 Opportunity Zone map

For the 2027 map, a census tract qualifies if its median family income is no more than 70 percent of the comparison median, or if its poverty rate is at least 20 percent and its median family income is no more than 125 percent of that median. Metro tracts are measured against their metropolitan area and non-metro tracts against their state. As of October 30, 2026, Treasury's list of tracts that pass is 25,461 long, per its September 23, 2026 eligible-tract file.

Passing the test makes a tract eligible. It becomes a zone only if the governor nominates it and Treasury certifies it, and no state can designate more than about a quarter of its eligible tracts. That process is covered on the 2027 designation round; this page is about the test itself.

The two-prong test

New section 1400Z-1(c)(1), added by P.L. 119-21 sec. 70421(b)(1), defines a low-income community two ways. A tract needs to meet only one.

The comparison median depends on where the tract sits. A tract inside a metropolitan area is compared only with the metropolitan area median family income. A tract outside one is compared only with the statewide median. The new text does not use the older "greater of" statewide or metro comparison.

Three tracts, tested

What changed from the 2018 map

Commentators, including the Economic Innovation Group, describe the change as lowering the income ceiling from 80 percent to 70 percent of area median family income. We have not re-read IRC 45D(e) to confirm the 80 percent figure, so treat that framing as reported by EIG.

The 2017 law produced 8,764 zones. The new test is applied fresh: a tract that overlaps a 2018 zone is eligible for the 2027 map only if it meets the new definition itself (Rev. Proc. 2026-14, sec. 3.01(2)).

The data behind the list

Treasury applied the test using the 2020–2024 American Community Survey 5-year data. For American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands, where ACS data are not available, it used the 2020 Decennial Census of Island Areas (Rev. Proc. 2026-14 sec. 3.01(1)). The state caps are also set from these data sets.

The boundaries come with the data. Because the eligible list is built on 2020 tract boundaries, those boundaries control and do not change during the 2027–2036 designation period (sec. 3.01(3)). The 2018 zones use 2010 tracts, so a single property can carry two different tract numbers, one for each map. Our tract checker takes an 11-digit GEOID and shows both.

How many tracts pass

Treasury's September 23, 2026 eligible-tract file lists 25,461 eligible tracts, 8,362 of them rural, which matters for the rural rules on rural Opportunity Zones. That is the 25,332 tracts in the April Rev. Proc. 2026-14 appendix (8,334 rural) plus 129 additions; none was removed. The largest counts on the September list are California (2,479), Texas (2,431), New York (1,716), Florida (1,367) and Ohio (1,040).

The additions came from two methods. 128 tracts have no published median family income, and they qualify when the upper bound of the tract's income distribution is used instead and comes out at or below 70 percent of the comparison median. One tract in Lahaina, Maui qualifies because of extraordinary temporary population displacement. The OpportunityZones.com tracker reported the 128 as an "Alternate Framework"; Treasury's file does not use that name.

The list may not be complete. The Rev. Proc. says some qualifying tracts may not appear on it, and Treasury will consider a governor's nomination of an unlisted tract if it comes with a detailed analysis, using current tract-level data, showing the tract meets the test (sec. 5.04).

Reading the official list

The appendix to Rev. Proc. 2026-14 is a spreadsheet with one row per eligible tract, identified by its 2020 census tract number, and a column marking each tract "Rural" or "Non-rural." Of the 25,332 rows, 8,334 are marked rural and 16,998 non-rural. Treasury also said it would publish the list as an online resource with mapping and demographic data for each tract (sec. 3.02). Its September 23, 2026 data transparency file is the current list: it covers all 85,529 tracts, flags the 25,461 that are eligible, and publishes the inputs Treasury used to test each one. Our data page offers the list in other formats.

Eligible is not designated

A state may designate no more than 25 percent of its eligible tracts in a designation period, rounded up; states with 25 to 99 eligible tracts may designate 25, and those with fewer may designate all. California's 2,479 eligible tracts on the September list, for example, give a computed cap of 620, the number its Department of Finance list shows as certified. Most eligible tracts will not become zones.

The CDFI Fund does not confirm whether a particular investment is in a zone. It points users to the Census Geocoder and the official map or list. Treasury had not published a national certified 2027 list as of October 30, 2026. Until it does, each state page at /opportunity-zones/<state>/ (see the state index) carries the current status and sources for that state, and the map shows both maps; see for communities for how local groups engage with the process.