Hardin County area

Population and density of Hardin County

The Census Bureau estimates that 113,482 people lived in Hardin County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #571 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #6 of 120 in Kentucky. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 110,698, the population has grown by 2,784 (+2.5%), compared with +2.2% for Kentucky as a whole.

With 623.9 square miles of land, that is 182 people per square mile (70 per km²), placing Hardin County #679 nationally for density and #16 in Kentucky. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Kentucky median is 59. Put another way, there are about 3.5 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 Hardin County

7 incorporated places lie at least partly in Hardin County. Together they are home to 66,879 people (58.9%); the other 46,603 (41.1%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Elizabethtown city, with 35,448 residents in the county. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Elizabethtown city grew fastest since then (+12.9%).

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

Metropolitan area

Hardin County is a central county of the Elizabethtown, KY Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 128,666 residents on 885 square miles of land; Hardin County accounts for 70.5% of the land and 88.2% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #296 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #325 by population. It belongs to the Louisville/Jefferson County--Elizabethtown, KY-IN Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

17 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Hardin County; 10 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

4005140121401404015040160401624017540177427014271242724427324274042748427764278442788

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 Hardin County

Hardin County shares a land border with 9 county equivalents, including 1 in Indiana. It has more land than every one of them. The largest neighbor is Breckinridge County (569.7 mi²) and the smallest is Larue County (261.1 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Hardin County forms a block of 4,253.1 mi² of land, of which it holds 14.7%.

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

Hardin County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.7 times as much. Kentucky’s county land could hold about 63 areas the size of Hardin County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 25 miles (40.2 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 Hardin County?

Hardin County has more land than 1,677 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 Hardin County at #1,642 nationally by total area, 97 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%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.2 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 Hardin 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.