US Counties With the Lowest Population (BEA Regional Accounts)
3,089 US counties ranked by population (bea regional accounts), from lowest to highest. First are Alpine County, CA (664.31), Esmeralda County, NV (753.64) and Arthur County, NE (770.37). The middle one of the 3,089 has 1004.41.
What this measures
How many people live here, as the Bureau of Economic Analysis counts them to work out per-person figures. Source: BEA Regional Accounts.
This is a count, so it is ranked per 1,000 residents. Ranked by the raw total, it would just list the biggest counties.
For most measures, a national ranking mostly sorts places by income and by how urban they are. Each county’s own page compares it with the 50 counties most like it instead, which is often the fairer view.
The 100 lowest counties
Every state, lowest first
Each state’s own published figure, not an average of its counties.
| Rank | State | Per 1,000 residents |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | West Virginia | 992.18 |
| 2 | Louisiana | 992.88 |
| 3 | New York | 993.19 |
| 4 | Illinois | 996.01 |
| 5 | Hawaii | 997.07 |
| 6 | Mississippi | 997.21 |
| 7 | California | 998.88 |
| 8 | Pennsylvania | 1002.43 |
| 9 | New Mexico | 1003.04 |
| 10 | Michigan | 1003.12 |
| 11 | Alaska | 1003.46 |
| 12 | Oregon | 1003.54 |
| 13 | Ohio | 1003.74 |
| 14 | Kansas | 1004.74 |
| 15 | Vermont | 1005.36 |
| 16 | Missouri | 1006.46 |
| 17 | Wisconsin | 1006.51 |
| 18 | Minnesota | 1006.87 |
| 19 | Iowa | 1007.03 |
| 20 | Rhode Island | 1007.33 |
| 21 | Maryland | 1007.51 |
| 22 | Kentucky | 1008.84 |
| 23 | Virginia | 1008.92 |
| 24 | Wyoming | 1009.16 |
| 25 | Indiana | 1010.03 |
| 26 | New Hampshire | 1010.35 |
| 27 | Massachusetts | 1010.61 |
| 28 | Nebraska | 1011.18 |
| 29 | New Jersey | 1012.15 |
| 30 | Arkansas | 1012.15 |
| 31 | Connecticut | 1012.41 |
| 32 | North Dakota | 1012.43 |
| 33 | Alabama | 1012.55 |
| 34 | Washington | 1015.03 |
| 35 | Colorado | 1015.58 |
| 36 | Maine | 1016.12 |
| 37 | Oklahoma | 1017.18 |
| 38 | South Dakota | 1021.25 |
| 39 | Georgia | 1022.31 |
| 40 | District of Columbia | 1022.68 |
| 41 | Tennessee | 1023.22 |
| 42 | Nevada | 1023.37 |
| 43 | Montana | 1023.74 |
| 44 | North Carolina | 1028.03 |
| 45 | Arizona | 1028.18 |
| 46 | Delaware | 1030.35 |
| 47 | South Carolina | 1033.58 |
| 48 | Utah | 1033.62 |
| 49 | Texas | 1036.70 |
| 50 | Idaho | 1041.09 |
| 51 | Florida | 1044.51 |
More on population (bea regional accounts)
- US Counties With the Highest Population (BEA Regional Accounts)
- Population (BEA Regional Accounts) by US county: map by year and what it goes with
A ranking describes places, not the people in them, and a high or low place does not by itself say why. All US rankings.