No joke: Las Vegas not that funny according to science

One might assume that in a ranking of the nation’s funniest cities, Las Vegas — with its comedy clubs and wide variety of visiting comedians — would at least not end up near the bottom of the list.

One might be wrong.

Researchers at the University of Colorado recently devised a humor algorithm to identify the funniest cities among America’s 50 largest. The algorithm ranked the cities based on surveys of residents on the prevalence of humor in their daily lives, along with comedians, number of visits to comedy websites, tweets and radio stations, native-born comedians per capita and comedy clubs per square mile.

Of the 50 largest cities, Chicago was deemed the funniest, being called the “capital of improvisation and a mecca of stand-up comedy,” according to The New York Times. Here are the top 10:

1. Chicago

2. Boston

3. Atlanta

4. Washington

5. Portland, Ore.

6. New York City

7. Los Angeles

8. Denver

9. San Francisco

10. Seattle

The least funny cities were all clustered in the south, aside from Las Vegas and Tucson, Ariz:

41. El Paso, Texas

42. Tucson, Ariz.

43. Las Vegas

44. Virginia Beach, Va.

45. Tulsa, Okla.

46. Arlington, Texas

47. San Antonio, Texas

48. Miami, Fla.

49. Jacksonville, Fla.

50. Fort Worth, Texas

Check out the full list here. Do you agree? Let us know on Twitter: @reviewjournal

Contact Stephanie Grimes at sgrimes@reviewjournal.com. Find her on Twitter: @stephgrimes