A month after Asheville made Travel + Leisure’s 2025 list of best U.S. travel destinations, another Western North Carolina town has been recognized by the website.
Travel media website Travel + Leisure publishes travel guides, lists of suggestions and more. On July 18, the Citizen Times covered Asheville’s inclusion among the publication’s best U.S. travel destinations of 2025. The city was chosen based on a survey with more than 657,000 respondents.
In a new study, T+L recognized America’s best small towns across a number of categories including small beach towns, small shopping towns, small food and drinks towns and more. With the help of an expert panel, one WNC town stood out. Here’s what T+L loved, plus the whole list and more.
“Rising from the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene, Boone, North Carolina, hums with a renewed spirit.”
Boone was the winner of T+L’s “best mountain town” category for 2025. Andy Long, chef and co-owner of Over Yonder, was quoted in the entry, describing his love of the town as a place that was “small enough to know your neighbors, big enough to have a vibrant dining and music scene.”
The town’s entry on the list also included a number of suggestions for what to do while visiting Boone. Here’s what writers urged travelers to try:
The full list of America’s best small towns according to T+L:
Iris Seaton is the trending news reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach her at iseaton@citizentimes.com.

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