Recycling access is widespread for U.S. single-family households but much less common for multifamily homes. The 2024 State of Recycling estimate put access at 85% for single-family households, 37% for multifamily homes, and 73% across all households. EPA assessments use different definitions and found that about 40% of households lacked recycling service equivalent in quality to their trash service.
Contents
- How many U.S. households have recycling access?
- How recycling access varies by state
- What materials recycling programs accept
- Access and household recycling participation
- What access-expansion projects have achieved
- Infrastructure and investment needed to expand access
How many U.S. households have recycling access?
The Recycling Partnership’s State of Recycling 2024: Present and Future of Residential Recycling in the U.S. estimates physical access to a recycling container. For qualifying single-family households, drop-off service counts as access; for multifamily households, the measure uses on-property collection. Households that could subscribe to a service but did not are excluded from this definition. These are 2024 report estimates, not 2026 measurements. (State of Recycling 2024)
The report estimates:
- 85% of U.S. single-family households had recycling access.
- 15% of U.S. single-family households lacked recycling access.
- 37% of U.S. multifamily homes had recycling access.
- 63% of U.S. multifamily homes lacked recycling access.
- Across all U.S. households, 73% had recycling access.
- 27% of all U.S. households lacked recycling access.
The household-type gap is the central access pattern in these figures. The estimated share with access was 48 percentage points higher for single-family households than for multifamily homes. That comparison describes the report’s physical-access measure; it does not mean that every accessible program offers the same collection frequency, material list, or service quality.
EPA’s 2024 assessment provides a different view. It reported that 6% of U.S. homes had no access to any recycling service, including municipal service, subscription service, or drop-off options within municipal boundaries. EPA also reported that roughly 40% of U.S. households lacked recycling service equivalent in quality to their trash-disposal service. In the same assessment, 12% of multifamily units lacked access to any recycling service, while 81% of single-family households had access to curbside collection. (EPA, An Assessment of the U.S. Recycling System)
These percentages should not be compared as if they measured the same thing. The Recycling Partnership’s access measure counts qualifying containers and service arrangements under its stated method. EPA’s equivalent-access figures concern the relationship between recycling service and trash-disposal service, while its no-service figure includes several service types.
How recycling access varies by state
The 2024 state estimates show a broad spread in household access. Delaware was estimated at 97%, Maryland at 96%, and both California and the District of Columbia at 95%. Vermont was estimated at 92%, and New York at 89%. At the lower end of the supplied state estimates, New Mexico was at 79%, Alaska at 77%, Mississippi at 37%, and North Dakota at 34%. (State of Recycling 2024)
| State or district | Estimated household access | Measurement period |
|---|---|---|
| Delaware | 97% | 2024 report estimate |
| Maryland | 96% | 2024 report estimate |
| California | 95% | 2024 report estimate |
| District of Columbia | 95% | 2024 report estimate |
| Vermont | 92% | 2024 report estimate |
| New York | 89% | 2024 report estimate |
| New Mexico | 79% | 2024 report estimate |
| Alaska | 77% | 2024 report estimate |
| Mississippi | 37% | 2024 report estimate |
| North Dakota | 34% | 2024 report estimate |
The highest and lowest supplied state estimates differ by 63 percentage points. The report notes that underlying datasets and assumptions vary, so these state figures are estimates reported in 2024 rather than a uniform 2026 measurement. They are useful for showing geographic variation, but they should be read with the report’s methodological limitations in mind.
What materials recycling programs accept
Access does not guarantee that a household can place every recyclable material in its local program. The Recycling Partnership’s 2024 database estimate puts national material acceptance at 72% when film and flexible materials are included, compared with 80% without them. In other words, the material-acceptance result changes with the treatment of film and flexible materials; it is not a single universal list of items accepted everywhere. (State of Recycling 2024)
| Location | With film and flexible materials | Without film | Measurement period |
|---|---|---|---|
| United States | 72% | 80% | 2024 database estimate |
| California | 82% | 90% | 2024 database estimate |
| District of Columbia | 88% | 98% | 2024 database estimate |
| Delaware | 85% | 95% | 2024 database estimate |
| Hawaii | 46% | 51% | 2024 database estimate |
| West Virginia | 55% | 61% | 2024 database estimate |
| Alabama | 59% | 64% | 2024 database estimate |
| Rhode Island | 84% | 94% | 2024 database estimate |
| Oregon | 63% | 70% | 2024 database estimate |
| New York | 80% | 89% | 2024 database estimate |
The supplied state material estimates range from 46% with film in Hawaii to 88% in the District of Columbia. Without film, the range is 51% to 98%. The report’s database estimates therefore show two separate access questions: whether a household can use a recycling service, and which materials that service accepts.
Access and household recycling participation
Participation is lower than access in the 2024 State of Recycling analysis. An estimated 59% of U.S. households with recycling access used their available program, while an estimated 43% of all U.S. households participated in recycling. These figures are estimates from the 2024 analysis, and the report notes that underlying assumptions vary, including assumed participation rates for some service types. (State of Recycling 2024)
State participation estimates among households with access were 72% in Hawaii, 70% in Utah, 68% in Colorado, and 65% in California. The supplied lower estimates were 45% in Maine, 41% in West Virginia, and 40% in Vermont. These are not overall household participation rates; they describe participation among households estimated to have access.
The pattern matters for interpreting access statistics. A community can expand the number of households with a container or collection option and still see a smaller share of all households participating. Service availability, accepted materials, and actual use are separate measurements. The 2024 report figures do not establish a single cause for the differences between states or service types.
What access-expansion projects have achieved
Local projects show how access changes can be measured in households, capacity, and recovered material. In 2021, The Recycling Partnership awarded Omaha an $825,000 grant to replace recycling bins with new carts. The project supplied more than 135,000 new recycling carts, increased residential recycling capacity by more than five times, and Omaha reported a 68% increase in recycling tonnage after the replacement. (State of Recycling 2024)
Orlando’s 2019 ordinance required recycling across the city’s 75,000 multifamily residential units. Two grant-supported projects in Orlando added recycling access for nearly 50,000 homes. The projects were reported in 2024 as diverting 1,200 new tons of recyclables annually. The relevant project period was 2019–2021, with the annual result reported in 2024.
Access can also be restored after it is lost. Nearly 7,200 Alleghany County, North Carolina, households lost recycling access when a drop-off facility closed in 2020. After the facility reopened, it captured more than 50 tons of new recyclable material per year. That result is reported as an annual outcome in 2024, not as a forecast.
Together, these examples quantify different effects: more containers and capacity in Omaha, expanded multifamily coverage in Orlando, and recovered service plus new material capture in Alleghany County. They are individual project results, not national averages.
Infrastructure and investment needed to expand access
EPA’s 2024 recycling infrastructure assessment places packaging and organic recyclable materials at approximately 82% of the U.S. municipal solid waste stream within its assessment scope. EPA estimated that improving curbside, drop-off, and processing infrastructure by 2030 would require $36.5 billion to $43.4 billion. In that modeled investment scenario, an additional 82 million to 89 million tons of packaging and organic waste could be recovered by 2030. (EPA, U.S. Recycling Infrastructure Assessment)
EPA described the modeled 82-million-to-89-million-ton increase as a 91% increase over the estimated 94 million tons recycled and composted in its 2018 Facts and Figures baseline. The same scenario modeled the national recycling rate rising from 32% to 61% by 2030. These are modeled outcomes and investment scenarios, not guarantees. The 2018 figure is a baseline, while 2030 is the modeled target period.
EPA’s separate financial assessment estimated that the United States generates around 96 million tons of packaging-material waste and recycles 39% of it. It estimated that expanding packaging recycling access and infrastructure could recycle an additional 38 million to 45 million tons of packaging material. The estimated investment needed for packaging curbside, drop-off, and processing infrastructure to provide access equivalent to trash disposal was $22 billion to $28 billion. (EPA, An Assessment of the U.S. Recycling System)
The two EPA assessments describe related but different scopes. The broader infrastructure scenario covers packaging and organic materials and estimates $36.5 billion to $43.4 billion by 2030. The packaging-focused assessment estimates $22 billion to $28 billion for packaging infrastructure and gives a separate 96-million-ton packaging-waste estimate. Both sets of figures are assessments or modeled scenarios; neither guarantees a particular national access rate or recovery result.