Boyd County area

Population and density of Boyd County

The Census Bureau estimates that 47,751 people lived in Boyd County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,056 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #22 of 120 in Kentucky. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 48,260, the population has declined by 509 (−1.1%), compared with +2.2% for Kentucky as a whole.

With 159.9 square miles of land, that is 299 people per square mile (115 per km²), placing Boyd County #512 nationally for density and #8 in Kentucky. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Kentucky median is 59. Put another way, there are about 2.1 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 Boyd County

2 incorporated places lie at least partly in Boyd County. Together they are home to 22,718 people (47.6%); the other 25,033 (52.4%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Ashland city, with 20,996 residents in the county. The county seat, Catlettsburg city, has 1,722 residents.

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

Metropolitan area

Boyd County is a central county of the Huntington-Ashland, WV-KY-OH Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 8 county equivalents have 365,965 residents on 2,915.5 square miles of land; Boyd County accounts for 5.5% of the land and 13% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #102 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #156 by population. It belongs to the Charleston-Huntington-Ashland, WV-OH-KY Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

4 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Boyd County, and each lies mostly inside the county.

41101411024112941168

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 Boyd County

Boyd County shares a land border with 5 county equivalents, including 2 in West Virginia and Ohio. Each of them has more land than Boyd County. The largest neighbor is Wayne County (506 mi²) and the smallest is Greenup County (344.5 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Boyd County forms a block of 2,288.8 mi² of land, of which it holds 7%.

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

Boyd County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 6.5 times as much. Kentucky’s county land could hold about 247 areas the size of Boyd County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 12.6 miles (20.3 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 Boyd County?

Boyd County has more land than 169 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 Boyd County at #3,072 nationally by total area, 19 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 1.3%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.2 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 Boyd 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.