Menard County area

Population and density of Menard County

The Census Bureau estimates that 11,863 people lived in Menard County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #2,360 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #83 of 102 in Illinois. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 12,297, the population has declined by 434 (−3.5%), compared with −0.8% for Illinois as a whole.

With 314.4 square miles of land, that is 38 people per square mile (15 per km²), placing Menard County #1,802 nationally for density and #63 in Illinois. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Illinois median is 44. Put another way, there are about 17 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 Menard County

5 incorporated places lie at least partly in Menard County. Together they are home to 5,370 people (45.3%); the other 6,493 (54.7%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Petersburg city, with 2,125 residents in the county. By land, Athens city is the largest at 1.684 mi².

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

Metropolitan area

Menard County is an outlying county of the Springfield, IL Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 206,033 residents on 1,182.6 square miles of land; Menard County accounts for 26.6% of the land and 5.8% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #261 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #234 by population. It belongs to the Springfield-Jacksonville-Lincoln, IL Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

8 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Menard County; 5 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

6261362642626666267362675626776268862693

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 Menard County

Menard County shares a land border with 4 county equivalents. Each of them has more land than Menard County. The largest neighbor is Sangamon County (868.2 mi²) and the smallest is Cass County (375.8 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Menard County forms a block of 2,715.8 mi² of land, of which it holds 11.6%.

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

Menard County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 3.3 times as much. Illinois’s county land could hold about 177 areas the size of Menard County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 17.7 miles (28.5 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 Menard County?

Menard County has more land than 447 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 Menard County at #2,811 nationally by total area, 36 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% — 0.8 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 Menard 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.