Which US states get the most hurricane landfalls
Florida has by far the most landfalls in the Atlantic best track: 229 storms with a landfall record there since 1851, 107 of them at hurricane strength and 38 as major hurricanes. Louisiana (98) and Texas (95) follow, then North Carolina (69). Together these four hold 75% of all the storm-and-state landfall pairs on United States coasts.
How the count works
HURDAT2 marks each moment a storm's center crosses a coastline with a landfall record. This site places each record in the state whose coast lies nearest, then counts storms, not records: a storm that crossed into Florida twice counts once for Florida. A storm that hit two states counts once in each, so the state totals add up to more than the number of storms. Across the whole record, 291 storms made at least one hurricane-strength landfall on a United States coast, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands included, and 31 of them did so in two or more states. One gap matters: the Atlantic file has no landfall records for the seasons 1976 to 1982, so storms of those years are missing from every count here.
Every state and territory in the record
| State | Storms | As hurricanes | As major | Strongest landfall | Latest |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Florida | 229 | 107 | 38 | Storm 3 of 1935, 185 mph | 2024 |
| Louisiana | 98 | 52 | 19 | Storm 1 of 1856, 150 mph | 2024 |
| Texas | 95 | 52 | 17 | Storm 5 of 1886, 150 mph | 2024 |
| North Carolina | 69 | 35 | 3 | Storm 3 of 1899, 120 mph | 2023 |
| South Carolina | 39 | 25 | 4 | Hugo (1989), 140 mph | 2025 |
| Alabama | 19 | 10 | 3 | Storm 2 of 1916, 120 mph | 2020 |
| New York | 19 | 10 | 3 | Storm 6 of 1938, 120 mph | 2021 |
| Mississippi | 18 | 10 | 3 | Camille (1969), 175 mph | 2018 |
| Georgia | 15 | 5 | 3 | Storm 7 of 1898, 130 mph | 2003 |
| Massachusetts | 11 | 5 | 0 | Edna (1954), 110 mph | 2006 |
| Puerto Rico | 9 | 5 | 3 | Maria (2017), 155 mph | 2022 |
| Rhode Island | 8 | 3 | 1 | Storm 6 of 1869, 115 mph | 2021 |
| Connecticut | 6 | 3 | 1 | Storm 6 of 1938, 115 mph | 1961 |
| Maine | 6 | 2 | 0 | Storm 10 of 1869, 105 mph | 1991 |
| US Virgin Islands | 5 | 3 | 2 | Lenny (1999), 155 mph | 2024 |
| New Jersey | 4 | 1 | 0 | Storm 4 of 1903, 80 mph | 2020 |
| Virginia | 4 | 0 | 0 | Doria (1971), 70 mph | 1992 |
| Hawaii | 1 | 0 | 0 | Iselle (2014), 60 mph | 2014 |
| Maryland | 1 | 0 | 0 | Storm 11 of 1893, 50 mph | 1893 |
Florida's long coastline
Florida's lead comes partly from geography. The peninsula sticks out into the paths of storms coming from the east and from the Gulf, and its coast runs from the Panhandle around the Keys to the Georgia line. Of the 291 storms with a United States hurricane landfall, 107 came ashore in Florida as hurricanes: 37%. The strongest Florida landfall in the file is Storm 3 of 1935, at 185 mph; the Florida page maps every one.
Florida's major-hurricane landfalls since 2000 make the point in names: Charley (2004), Jeanne (2004), Dennis (2005), Wilma (2005), Irma (2017), Michael (2018), Ian (2022), Idalia (2023), Helene (2024) and Milton (2024), 10 storms in 25 seasons.
The Gulf coast
West of Florida the four Gulf states share 230 storm-landfall pairs. Texas and Louisiana have nearly the same totals, and their strongest landfalls tie: Storm 5 of 1886 in Texas and Storm 1 of 1856 in Louisiana both reached the coast at 150 mph. Mississippi's strongest, Camille (1969) at 175 mph, is the strongest landfall on any Gulf state west of Florida.
The East Coast
North Carolina's Outer Banks reach far into the Atlantic and catch storms that curve north past Florida, which explains a total of 69 storms. Yet only 3 of them came ashore as major hurricanes, against 4 in South Carolina from 39 storms. Farther north landfalls thin out quickly. Virginia has 4 storms with a landfall record and none at hurricane strength. New York's 19 include Storm 6 of 1938, which came ashore there at 120 mph.
Decade by decade, month by month
Counting storms with at least one hurricane-strength landfall on a United States coast, the busiest decade in the file is the 1880s, with 23 storms, and the quietest full decade outside the 1976–1982 gap is the 1920s, with 13. The 1970s show only 6, but seven of those ten seasons have no landfall records at all, so that figure is not a real low. Since 2020 the count already stands at 17.
By month, 37% of these storms made their first United States hurricane landfall in September, and 81% between August and October. June and July together hold 48, and November 5.
| Month of first US hurricane landfall | Storms | Share |
|---|---|---|
| May | 1 | 0% |
| June | 19 | 7% |
| July | 29 | 10% |
| August | 73 | 25% |
| September | 107 | 37% |
| October | 57 | 20% |
| November | 5 | 2% |
Storms that hit more than one state
Of the storms with a United States hurricane landfall, 31 came ashore as hurricanes in two or more states. Only one did so in more than two: Donna (1960), with hurricane landfall records in Florida, North Carolina, New York and Connecticut. The most common pair is Florida and Louisiana, shared by 8 storms.
The three most recent storms with hurricane landfalls in two states are Katrina (2005), Nate (2017) and Ian (2022). Each counts once in both states' totals above.
What these counts leave out
A landfall record says where the center crossed the coast, nothing more. A storm that stayed just offshore, or brushed a coast with its outer winds, has no landfall there at all. To see every storm that passed near a town, landfall or not, use the storm finder. And because the early record is thinner, especially before 1900, counts by state compare an incomplete nineteenth century with a well-observed twentieth.
Sources
NOAA National Hurricane Center, HURDAT2 Atlantic 1851–2025 and Northeast and North Central Pacific 1949–2025. Landsea, C. W. and J. L. Franklin, 2013, Monthly Weather Review 141, 3576–3592. Counts, ranks and totals worked out on this site; see how to read the record.