Barrow County area

Population and density of Barrow County

The Census Bureau estimates that 99,773 people lived in Barrow County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #628 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #28 of 159 in Georgia. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 83,575, the population has grown by 16,198 (+19.4%), compared with +5.5% for Georgia as a whole.

With 161.1 square miles of land, that is 619 people per square mile (239 per km²), placing Barrow County #283 nationally for density and #17 in Georgia. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Georgia median is 69. Put another way, there are about 1 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 Barrow County

6 incorporated places lie at least partly in Barrow County. Together they are home to 38,268 people (38.4%); the other 61,505 (61.6%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Winder city, with 21,252 residents in the county. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Braselton town grew fastest since then (+37.5%).

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

Metropolitan area

Barrow County is an outlying county of the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA Metropolitan Statistical Area, in the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA metropolitan division. Its 29 county equivalents have 6,482,182 residents on 8,784.1 square miles of land; Barrow County accounts for 1.8% of the land and 1.5% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #10 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #6 by population. It belongs to the Atlanta--Athens-Clarke County--Sandy Springs, GA-AL Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

8 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Barrow County; 4 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

3001130517305483062030622306563066630680

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 Barrow County

Barrow County shares a land border with 4 county equivalents. Each of them has more land than Barrow County. The largest neighbor is Gwinnett County (431.2 mi²) and the smallest is Oconee County (184.4 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Barrow County forms a block of 1,443.1 mi² of land, of which it holds 11.2%.

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

Barrow County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 6.4 times as much. Georgia’s county land could hold about 358 areas the size of Barrow County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 12.7 miles (20.4 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 Barrow County?

Barrow County has more land than 172 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 Barrow County at #3,070 nationally by total area, 20 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 1.1%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2%. The two percentages are within 0.1 percentage points of each other. 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 Barrow 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.