Merrick County area

Population and density of Merrick County

The Census Bureau estimates that 7,905 people lived in Merrick County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #2,656 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #36 of 93 in Nebraska. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 7,662, the population has grown by 243 (+3.2%), compared with +2.9% for Nebraska as a whole.

With 487.8 square miles of land, that is 16 people per square mile (6.3 per km²), placing Merrick County #2,433 nationally for density and #27 in Nebraska. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Nebraska median is 8. Put another way, there are about 39 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 Merrick County

5 incorporated places lie at least partly in Merrick County. Together they are home to 4,553 people (57.6%); the other 3,352 (42.4%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Central City city, with 3,184 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Merrick County is an outlying county of the Grand Island, NE Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 3 county equivalents have 78,076 residents on 1,603.6 square miles of land; Merrick County accounts for 30.4% of the land and 10.1% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #205 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #386 by population.

ZIP codes

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

686286863868663688016881668826688276886468872

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 Merrick County

Merrick County shares a land border with 6 county equivalents. It has more land than 2 of them. The largest neighbor is Platte County (675.2 mi²) and the smallest is Polk County (438.8 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Merrick County forms a block of 3,701.2 mi² of land, of which it holds 13.2%.

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

Merrick County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 2.1 times as much. Nebraska’s county land could hold about 157 areas the size of Merrick County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 22.1 miles (35.5 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 Merrick County?

Merrick County has more land than 1,092 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 Merrick County at #2,198 nationally by total area, 68 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 1.8%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.6 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 Merrick 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.