Bethel Census Area area

Population and density of Bethel Census Area

The Census Bureau estimates that 18,391 people lived in Bethel Census Area on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,974 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #6 of 30 in Alaska. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 18,665, the population has declined by 274 (−1.5%), compared with +0.5% for Alaska as a whole.

With 40,654.9 square miles of land, that is 0.45 people per square mile (0.17 per km²), placing Bethel Census Area #3,198 nationally for density and #19 in Alaska. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Alaska median is 0.73. Put another way, there are about 1,415 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 Bethel Census Area

18 incorporated places lie at least partly in Bethel Census Area. Together they are home to 13,314 people (72.4%); the other 5,077 (27.6%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Bethel city, with 6,626 residents in the county. By land, Nightmute city is the largest at 98.8 mi².

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

Metropolitan area

Bethel Census Area is not part of any metropolitan or micropolitan statistical area in the Office of Management and Budget’s July 2023 delineation; 1,306 other county equivalents are also outside one. These areas are built around an urban core of at least 10,000 people plus the counties tied to it by commuting, so counties outside them are generally rural.

ZIP codes

27 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Bethel Census Area, and each lies mostly inside the county.

995039955199552995579955999561995759957899589996079960999614996219962299626996309963499637996419965199655996569966899679996809968199690

ZIP Code Tabulation Areas are the Census Bureau’s approximations of USPS ZIP Code service areas, from the 2020 Census relationship files. Post-office-box and single-address ZIP Codes have no tabulation area.

Counties bordering Bethel Census Area

Bethel Census Area shares a land border with 6 county equivalents. It has more land than 5 of them. The largest neighbor is Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area (145,767.5 mi²) and the smallest is Kenai Peninsula Borough (16,017.1 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Bethel Census Area forms a block of 286,546.4 mi² of land, of which it holds 14.2%.

How big is Bethel Census Area compared with U.S. states?

Bethel Census Area has more land than 15 of the 50 states. It is about 1 times the land area of Kentucky (39,485.8 mi²), while Ohio, the next larger state, has 1 times as much land (40,859.1 mi²). Alaska’s county land could hold about 14 areas the size of Bethel Census Area.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 201.6 miles (324.5 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 Bethel Census Area?

Bethel Census Area has more land than 3,219 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 Bethel Census Area at #3 nationally by total area, the same position as its land rank. Changing the area definition does not change its position in this release.

Its water share is 10.8%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 9.6 percentage points higher. 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 Bethel Census Area 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.