Stearns County area

Population and density of Stearns County

The Census Bureau estimates that 164,110 people lived in Stearns County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #429 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #8 of 87 in Minnesota. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 158,282, the population has grown by 5,828 (+3.7%), compared with +2.2% for Minnesota as a whole.

With 1,342.9 square miles of land, that is 122 people per square mile (47 per km²), placing Stearns County #866 nationally for density and #13 in Minnesota. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Minnesota median is 27. Put another way, there are about 5.2 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 Stearns County

Stearns County is divided into 65 municipalities and townships. In Minnesota, county subdivisions are local governments, and together they cover all of the county’s land and residents.

The most populous is St. Cloud city, with 57,657 residents (35.1% of the county). The largest by land is Maine Prairie township, at 61.9 mi², or 4.6% of the county’s land. Among those with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Avon city grew fastest since then (+9.6%).

Population: U.S. Census Bureau Vintage 2025 subcounty estimates, counting only the part of each subdivision inside Stearns County. Land: 2026 Census Gazetteer. How communities are listed.

Metropolitan area

Stearns County is a central county of the St. Cloud, MN Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 205,854 residents on 1,751.2 square miles of land; Stearns County accounts for 76.7% of the land and 79.7% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #179 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #235 by population. It belongs to the Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN-WI Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

33 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Stearns County; 26 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

553205532955353553825538956301563035630756310563125631456316563205632156325563315633556336563405635256356563625636756368563695637156374563755637656377563785638556387

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 Stearns County

Stearns County shares a land border with 9 county equivalents. It has more land than every one of them. The largest neighbor is Morrison County (1,125.1 mi²) and the smallest is Benton County (408.3 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Stearns County forms a block of 7,632.3 mi² of land, of which it holds 17.6%.

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

Stearns County has more land than 1 of the 50 states. It is about 1.3 times the land area of Rhode Island (1,033.9 mi²), while Delaware, the next larger state, has 1.5 times as much land (1,948.6 mi²). Minnesota’s county land could hold about 59 areas the size of Stearns County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 36.6 miles (59 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 Stearns County?

Stearns County has more land than 2,777 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 Stearns County at #496 nationally by total area, 51 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 3.4%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 2.2 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 Stearns 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.