Heard County area

Population and density of Heard County

The Census Bureau estimates that 12,149 people lived in Heard County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #2,343 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #115 of 159 in Georgia. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 11,410, the population has grown by 739 (+6.5%), compared with +5.5% for Georgia as a whole.

With 296 square miles of land, that is 41 people per square mile (16 per km²), placing Heard County #1,729 nationally for density and #104 in Georgia. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Georgia median is 69. Put another way, there are about 16 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 Heard County

3 incorporated places lie at least partly in Heard County. Together they are home to 1,865 people (15.4%); the other 10,284 (84.6%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Franklin city, with 999 residents in the county. By land, Ephesus city is the largest at 3.694 mi².

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

Metropolitan area

Heard 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; Heard County accounts for 3.4% of the land and 0.2% 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

6 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Heard County; 1 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

301083017030217302303024030263

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 Heard County

Heard County shares a land border with 4 county equivalents, including 1 in Alabama. Each of them has more land than Heard County. The largest neighbor is Randolph County (580.6 mi²) and the smallest is Troup County (414 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Heard County forms a block of 2,230.7 mi² of land, of which it holds 13.3%.

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

Heard County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 3.5 times as much. Georgia’s county land could hold about 195 areas the size of Heard County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 17.2 miles (27.7 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 Heard County?

Heard County has more land than 408 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 Heard County at #2,847 nationally by total area, 33 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 1.7%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.5 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 Heard 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.