Dale County area

Population and density of Dale County

The Census Bureau estimates that 49,912 people lived in Dale County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,028 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #28 of 67 in Alabama. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 49,327, the population has grown by 585 (+1.2%), compared with +3.3% for Alabama as a whole.

With 561.1 square miles of land, that is 89 people per square mile (34 per km²), placing Dale County #1,081 nationally for density and #25 in Alabama. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Alabama median is 49. Put another way, there are about 7.2 acres of land per resident.

U.S. Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 population estimates. Estimates are revised each year and are not decennial census counts. Density divides the whole population by the whole county’s land area, so it describes an average, not how settlement is distributed within the county. Population sources and methods.

Cities and towns in Dale County

12 incorporated places lie at least partly in Dale County. Together they are home to 29,987 people (60.1%); the other 19,925 (39.9%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Ozark city, with 14,269 residents in the county. By land, Dothan city is the largest at 90.6 mi² across all its counties. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Dothan city grew fastest since then (+4.5%).

Population: U.S. Census Bureau Vintage 2025 subcounty estimates, counting only the part of each place inside Dale County. Land: 2026 Census Gazetteer, for the whole place even where it extends into other counties. How communities are listed.

Metropolitan area

Dale County is a central county of the Ozark, AL Micropolitan Statistical Area. Dale County is the area’s only county equivalent, so the micro area has the same 561.1 square miles of land. By combined land it ranks #388 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #226 by population. It belongs to the Dothan-Enterprise-Ozark, AL Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

14 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Dale County; 7 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

3601036303363113631736322363303634536350363523635336360363623637136374

ZIP Code Tabulation Areas are the Census Bureau’s approximations of USPS ZIP Code service areas, from the 2020 Census relationship files. Lighter codes have less than half of their land in this county. Post-office-box and single-address ZIP Codes have no tabulation area.

Counties bordering Dale County

Dale County shares a land border with 6 county equivalents. Each of them has more land than Dale County. The largest neighbor is Barbour County (885 mi²) and the smallest is Henry County (561.9 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Dale County forms a block of 4,513.5 mi² of land, of which it holds 12.4%.

How big is Dale County compared with U.S. states?

Dale County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.8 times as much. Alabama’s county land could hold about 90 areas the size of Dale County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 23.7 miles (38.1 km) on each side. Real county shapes are rarely square, so this is a scale reference rather than a width or driving distance.

State figures are the sums of each state’s county-equivalent land measurements in the same Census release, so states and counties are compared on the same basis. Published state totals can differ slightly because of rounding. Compare all states · Counties bigger than entire states.

What stands out about Dale County?

Dale County has more land than 1,377 of the other 3,221 county equivalents in the dataset.

A median is the middle county-equivalent measurement, not the average of the largest and smallest. All three bars use the same linear scale. Very small areas may appear as a thin sliver; the labels retain their values.

Does including water change its rank?

Using land plus water places Dale County at #1,967 nationally by total area, 122 places farther from the top than its land rank. Other county equivalents gain more area when their water measurements are included.

Its water share is 0.3%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.9 percentage points lower. This describes the statistical geography’s land/water mix, not flood exposure or developable land.

Closest positions in the national land ranking

These entries sit immediately beside Dale County in the national ranking. They can be in different states and are not necessarily geographic neighbors.

Calculated from the same Census release as the area table. Total-area order uses original ALAND + AWATER; water shares and chart labels use published square miles. Calculation details.