Newton County area

Population and density of Newton County

The Census Bureau estimates that 62,263 people lived in Newton County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #886 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #19 of 115 in Missouri. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 58,659, the population has grown by 3,604 (+6.1%), compared with +1.9% for Missouri as a whole.

With 624.8 square miles of land, that is 100 people per square mile (38 per km²), placing Newton County #1,001 nationally for density and #19 in Missouri. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Missouri median is 31. Put another way, there are about 6.4 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 Newton County

20 incorporated places lie at least partly in Newton County. Together they are home to 31,311 people (50.3%); the other 30,952 (49.7%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Neosho city, with 14,078 residents in the county. By land, Joplin city is the largest at 38.1 mi² across all its counties. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Neosho city grew fastest since then (+10.8%).

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

Metropolitan area

Newton County is an outlying county of the Joplin, MO-KS Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 3 county equivalents have 208,796 residents on 1,850.8 square miles of land; Newton County accounts for 33.8% of the land and 29.8% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #169 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #229 by population. It belongs to the Joplin-Miami, MO-OK-KS Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

15 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Newton County; 8 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

648046484064842648436484464850648586486164862648656486664867648736572365734

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 Newton County

Newton County shares a land border with 6 county equivalents, including 2 in Oklahoma and Kansas. It has more land than 4 of them. The largest neighbor is Barry County (778.1 mi²) and the smallest is Ottawa County (470.8 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Newton County forms a block of 4,251 mi² of land, of which it holds 14.7%.

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

Newton 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. Missouri’s county land could hold about 110 areas the size of Newton 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 Newton County?

Newton County has more land than 1,680 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 Newton County at #1,648 nationally by total area, 106 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% — 0.9 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 Newton 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.