Kearney County area

Population and density of Kearney County

The Census Bureau estimates that 6,790 people lived in Kearney County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #2,747 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #42 of 93 in Nebraska. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 6,686, the population has grown by 104 (+1.6%), compared with +2.9% for Nebraska as a whole.

With 516.2 square miles of land, that is 13 people per square mile (5.1 per km²), placing Kearney County #2,529 nationally for density and #35 in Nebraska. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Nebraska median is 8. Put another way, there are about 49 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 Kearney County

5 incorporated places lie at least partly in Kearney County. Together they are home to 4,354 people (64.1%); the other 2,436 (35.9%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Minden city, with 3,133 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Kearney County is an outlying county of the Kearney, NE Micropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 57,962 residents on 1,484.4 square miles of land; Kearney County accounts for 34.8% of the land and 11.7% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #112 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #176 by population.

ZIP codes

11 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Kearney County; 3 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

6884068845688476892468932689456894768956689596898168982

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 Kearney County

Kearney County shares a land border with 4 county equivalents. Each of them has more land than Kearney County. The largest neighbor is Buffalo County (968.2 mi²) and the smallest is Phelps County (539.8 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Kearney County forms a block of 3,163.3 mi² of land, of which it holds 16.3%.

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

Kearney 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 times as much. Nebraska’s county land could hold about 149 areas the size of Kearney County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 22.7 miles (36.6 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 Kearney County?

Kearney County has more land than 1,201 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 Kearney County at #2,116 nationally by total area, 95 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%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 1.1 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 Kearney 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.