Dallas County area

Population and density of Dallas County

The Census Bureau estimates that 18,025 people lived in Dallas County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,999 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #61 of 115 in Missouri. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 17,071, the population has grown by 954 (+5.6%), compared with +1.9% for Missouri as a whole.

With 541 square miles of land, that is 33 people per square mile (13 per km²), placing Dallas County #1,910 nationally for density and #53 in Missouri. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Missouri median is 31. Put another way, there are about 19 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 Dallas County

3 incorporated places lie at least partly in Dallas County. Together they are home to 4,101 people (22.8%); the other 13,924 (77.2%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Buffalo city, with 3,550 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Dallas County is an outlying county of the Springfield, MO Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 5 county equivalents have 500,694 residents on 3,007 square miles of land; Dallas County accounts for 18% of the land and 3.6% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #98 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #112 by population.

ZIP codes

13 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Dallas County; 7 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

65463655366559065622656326564465648656856572265764657676578365786

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 Dallas County

Dallas County shares a land border with 6 county equivalents. It has more land than 1 of them. The largest neighbor is Laclede County (764.7 mi²) and the smallest is Hickory County (398.8 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Dallas County forms a block of 4,263.7 mi² of land, of which it holds 12.7%.

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

Dallas County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.9 times as much. Missouri’s county land could hold about 127 areas the size of Dallas County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 23.3 miles (37.4 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 Dallas County?

Dallas County has more land than 1,291 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 Dallas County at #2,032 nationally by total area, 101 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 Dallas 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.