Jews began immigrating to Chicago in the 1830s, primarily from Eastern Europe and Germany.Cutler, Irving. "Jews." Encyclopedia of Chicago History. Retrieved on March 4, 2014.

Starting in the 1950s, the Jewish population within the city declined and by the end of the 20th century was older and more well-educated than the Chicago average.Cutler, "The Jews of Chicago: From Shtetl to Suburb," Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait, p. 165. At the end of the 20th century there were a total of 270,000 Jews in the Chicago area, with 30% in the city limits. In 1995, over 80% of the suburban Jewish population lived in the northern and northwestern suburbs of Chicago.Cutler, "The Jews of Chicago: From Shtetl to Suburb," Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait, p. 165-166. At this time, West Rogers Park was, and continues to be, the largest Jewish community within the city of Chicago. Recent decades have seen a resurgence in urban Chicago's Jewish population, particularly beyond the boundaries of traditional Jewish neighborhoods.

The 2020 estimate of the Jewish population in metropolitan Chicago is around 319,600, according to Brandeis University's Chicago Report. The population of Jewish people within the City of Chicago's limits is estimated to be around 120,000, with another 200,000 residing in the suburbs surrounding the major city.

Early history Jews began arriving in Chicago shortly after its incorporation in 1833. The first Jewish settlers were Ashkenazim, with a group of mostly Bavarian German Jews arriving in the late 1830s and early 1840s.Cutler, "The Jews of Chicago: From Shtetl to Suburb," Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait, p. 123. The first Jewish religious service in Chicago was held on Yom Kippur in 1845.Cutler, "The Jews of Chicago: From Shtetl to Suburb," Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait, p. 123-124. Many early Jewish immigrants worked as peddlers before establishing small stores, some of which grew into significant businesses. During this period, the Jewish community steadily expanded, and at the onset of the American Civil War, it organized a company of 100 Jewish recruits to join the 82nd Illinois Infantry Regiment.

Initially, most Jewish Chicagoans lived in the downtown area. Following the Great Chicago Fire, many relocated to the South Side. By the 1870s, the Jewish community centered around the neighborhood now known as Bronzeville before gradually moving farther south to lakefront neighborhoods such as Hyde Park, Kenwood, and South Shore.

Immigration from Eastern Europe The first wave of Eastern European Jewish immigration began in the 1870s, with many arriving from shtetls in Poland and Russia. These Eastern European Jews largely settled in the Maxwell Street area on Chicago's Near West Side, one of the city's poorest neighborhoods at the time. They founded the Maxwell Street Market and established 40 synagogues. Many worked as artisans, factory laborers (primarily in the clothing industry), peddlers, and small-scale merchants. Irving Cutler noted that this community recreated elements of the Old World shtetl, with its numerous Jewish institutions and culture.

Eastern European and German Jewish communities in Chicago remained largely separate until the mid-20th century due to differing cultural and religious practices.

By the 1910s, Eastern European Jews began relocating to wealthier neighborhoods. The largest group moved to North Lawndale on the West Side, while others settled in Northwest Side neighborhoods including Albany Park, Humboldt Park, and Logan Square. Lakefront neighborhoods on the North Side including Lakeview, Rogers Park, and Uptown also attracted Eastern European Jews. Additionally, some joined the established German Jewish community on the South Side.

The Maxwell Street area became a center of Jewish-American organized crime in America, when the area was dominated by Eastern European Jewish immigrants from the 1880s to the 1920s. Like other ethnic groups in the area, the Jews organized themselves into gangs. The Chicago Tribune in 1906 referred to the Maxwell Street area as "the crime center of the country". Other contemporary news reports refer to it as "Bloody Maxwell" and "the Wickedest Police District in the World." Independent Jewish groups ran by gangsters like Jules Portuguese, Davy Miller and Benjamin Zuckerman ran the Maxwell Street and greater Lawndale areas. Later Chicago Outfit affiliated Jews like Leonard Patrick and David Yaras took over the area when they killed Zuckerman and unseated his organization.

Early communities in satellite cities In the 19th century, Jews began settling in the satellite cities surrounding Chicago. Jewish communities and synagogues were established in many of these cities, including Waukegan, Maywood, Chicago Heights, Joliet, Elgin, and Aurora, as well as Hammond and Gary in Northwest Indiana. As urban sprawl expanded, these areas were gradually incorporated into the broader Chicago metropolitan area.

Growth and suburbanization By 1930, Chicago's Jewish population had grown to 275,000, making it the third largest Jewish community in the world after New York City and Warsaw.Cutler, "The Jews of Chicago: From Shtetl to Suburb," Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait, p. 122. Eastern European Jews made up 80% of the city's Jewish population, which accounted for 8% of Chicago's total residents at the time. The 1954 Study of the Jewish Population of Chicago made the following estimates of the Jewish population in 1931 by community area: North Lawndale – 75,400 West Town and Humboldt Park – 28,100 Albany Park – 23,400 West Garfield Park – 18,000 East Garfield Park – 15,300 South Shore – 11,600 Rogers Park – 10,800 Uptown and Edgewater – 9,600 Hyde Park – 9,000 Austin – 7,300 Logan Square – 7,100 Lakeview – 6,300 North Center/Irving Park/Avondale – 5,600 Englewood and Grand Crossing – 4,100 Kenwood – 4,100 North Park – 3,600 Woodlawn – 3,400 Chatham/Avalon Park/South Chicago – 3,200 Near North Side and Lincoln Park – 2,900 West Ridge (West Rogers Park) – 1,800 Lincoln Square – 1,500 West Lawn/Chicago Lawn (Marquette Park)/West Englewood – 800

Starting after World War II, wide-scale suburbanization of the Chicago-area Jewish community began, influenced by white flight, the availability of affordable vacant land, and the opening of the interstate highways. The percentage of Chicago-area Jews residing within the city limits declined from 95% in 1950 to 60% by the early 1960s. This shift paralleled a broader decline in Chicago's white population and their disinvestment from the city. By the early 1970s, the majority of Chicago-area Jews lived in the suburbs.

Intracity developments Population and institutional shifts within the City of Chicago accompanied suburbanization. The 1954 Study of the Jewish Population of Chicago made the following estimates of the Jewish population in 1951 by community area: North Lawndale – 42,300 Albany Park – 26,400 Rogers Park – 18,400 South Shore – 17,800 Uptown and Edgewater – 16,400 Lakeview – 16,100 Hyde Park – 14,700 West Town and Humboldt Park – 11,400 West Ridge (West Rogers Park) – 11,200 Austin – 7,400 Logan Square – 6,700 North Center/Irving Park/Avondale – 6,500 East Garfield Park – 5,600 West Garfield Park – 5,300 Chatham/Avalon Park/South Chicago – 5,300 Kenwood – 5,300 Near North Side and Lincoln Park – 5,000 North Park – 3,700 West Lawn/Chicago Lawn (Marquette Park)/West Englewood – 3,500 Englewood and Grand Crossing – 2,800 Lincoln Square – 2,100 Woodlawn – 1,900

North Lawndale's Jewish population plummeted from nearly 65,000 in 1946 to around 500 by 1956, largely due to white flight. Many Jews fleeing North Lawndale and other neighborhoods experiencing similar demographic shifts moved to West Rogers Park, which became the hub of Chicago's Orthodox Jewish community, along with its smaller neighboring community, North Park. West Rogers Park had a notable Jewish presence as early as the 1930s and, following the postwar migration, became majority-Jewish, peaking at around 47,000 Jewish residents in the 1960s.

During the 1950s, the South Side Jewish community expanded into neighborhoods including Jeffery Manor, Beverly, and Calumet Heights as Jews left neighborhoods with increasing Black populations such as Kenwood, Hyde Park, Woodlawn, Englewood, and Chatham. The 1960s saw a significant exodus of Jews from the South Side, largely driven by white flight, with most relocating to the North Side or the suburbs.

Temple Beth Am, the last synagogue in South Shore, merged with Temple Sholom in 1975. By that time, the Kenwood-Hyde Park area remained the only South Side neighborhood with a substantial Jewish population, along with small communities based around synagogues on the Southeast Side and in Marquette Park.

North Shore and suburbs In the post-World War I era, a group of wealthy Jews, primarily descendants of German immigrants, settled in Chicago's exclusive North Shore suburbs, including Glencoe and Highland Park.

Homebuilders, often Jewish themselves, advertised to Jewish communities and constructed single-family detached houses in suburbs near the Edens Expressway including Skokie and Lincolnwood. While the North Shore suburbs increasingly became home to wealthy Jewish families, some, especially Kenilworth and Lake Forest, barred Jews from moving in.Cutler, "The Jews of Chicago: From Shtetl to Suburb," Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait, p. 168 The Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago estimated in 1975 that 40,000 of Skokie's 70,000 residents were Jewish.

Chicago Southland The movement of Jews to the Cook County suburbs of the Calumet Region began in the late 1940s. This shift was sparked by the development of Park Forest, Illinois, and sprawled into the established Jewish community in nearby Chicago Heights. By 1949, Park Forest was home to a chapter of the National Council of Jewish Women, a B'nai B'rith lodge, and a Hebrew school.Park Forest: Birth of a Jewish Community:A Documentary Commentary. April 1951 In the 1950s, as the Jewish population grew to comprise 15% of the village's total population, two synagogues were established.

By the 1970s, nearby suburbs such as Homewood, Flossmoor, Olympia Fields, and Glenwood had notable Jewish population. This community has since dwindled due to white flight and its geographical isolation from other Jewish communities in Chicagoland.

As of 2024, two synagogues remain active in Chicago's South Suburbs: one in Homewood and one in Joliet.

Stabilization

1982 population study A 1982 study found there were about 248,000 Jews in the Chicago metropolitan area, making up about 4% of the population. By this time, the Jewish communities on the west and northwest sides of the city had almost completely disappeared. The city neighborhoods with the highest percentage of Jewish residents in 1982 were West Rogers Park and North Park. Outside of these neighborhoods, the vast majority of Jews who remained in the city lived in the lakefront neighborhoods north of the Loop. A smaller, but still sizable community, remained in Kenwood-Hyde Park. A small, shrinking, mostly elderly community remained in Albany Park, which only a few decades before had been one of the largest Jewish neighborhoods in the Midwest.

The 1982 study highlighted that the suburbs with the highest percentage of Jewish residents included Skokie and Lincolnwood (bordering West Rogers Park and North Park), Bannockburn, Deerfield, Highland Park, and Glencoe (situated on or near the North Shore), and a young, growing population in Buffalo Grove. Significant Jewish populations were found in the Calumet Region and in northern and northwestern suburbs, including Des Plaines and unincorporated Maine Township, Evanston, Glenview, Morton Grove, Niles, Northbrook, Wheeling, and Wilmette.

Irving Cutler's research