Steele County area

Population and density of Steele County

The Census Bureau estimates that 37,464 people lived in Steele County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,281 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #28 of 87 in Minnesota. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 37,409, the population has grown by 55 (+0.1%), compared with +2.2% for Minnesota as a whole.

With 429.6 square miles of land, that is 87 people per square mile (34 per km²), placing Steele County #1,093 nationally for density and #17 in Minnesota. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Minnesota median is 27. Put another way, there are about 7.3 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 Steele County

Steele County is divided into 17 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 Owatonna city, with 26,633 residents (71.1% of the county). The largest by land is Meriden township, at 36.1 mi², or 8.4% of the county’s land. Among those with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Medford city grew fastest since then (+4.5%).

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

Metropolitan area

Steele County is a central county of the Owatonna, MN Micropolitan Statistical Area. Steele County is the area’s only county equivalent, so the micro area has the same 429.6 square miles of land. By combined land it ranks #464 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #359 by population. It belongs to the Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN-WI Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

11 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Steele County; 4 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

5504955052550605591755924559465598556026560465607256093

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 Steele County

Steele County shares a land border with 5 county equivalents. It has more land than 1 of them. The largest neighbor is Mower County (711.3 mi²) and the smallest is Waseca County (423.4 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Steele County forms a block of 3,206.7 mi² of land, of which it holds 13.4%.

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

Steele County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 2.4 times as much. Minnesota’s county land could hold about 185 areas the size of Steele County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 20.7 miles (33.4 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 Steele County?

Steele County has more land than 856 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 Steele County at #2,433 nationally by total area, 67 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 0.6%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.5 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 Steele 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.