Cheshire County area

Population and density of Cheshire County

The Census Bureau estimates that 78,269 people lived in Cheshire County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #745 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #6 of 10 in New Hampshire. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 76,446, the population has grown by 1,823 (+2.4%), compared with +2.7% for New Hampshire as a whole.

With 706.7 square miles of land, that is 111 people per square mile (43 per km²), placing Cheshire County #927 nationally for density and #6 in New Hampshire. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the New Hampshire median is 136. Put another way, there are about 5.8 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 Cheshire County

Cheshire County is divided into 23 cities and towns. In New Hampshire, county subdivisions are local governments, and together they cover all of the county’s land and residents.

The most populous is Keene city, with 23,072 residents (29.5% of the county). The largest by land is Winchester town, at 55 mi², or 7.8% of the county’s land. Among those with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Stoddard town grew fastest since then (+6.2%).

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

Metropolitan area

Cheshire County is a central county of the Keene, NH Micropolitan Statistical Area. Cheshire County is the area’s only county equivalent, so the micro area has the same 706.7 square miles of land. By combined land it ranks #305 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #77 by population. It belongs to the Keene-Brattleboro, NH-VT Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

27 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Cheshire County; 25 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

032800343103441034430344403445034460344703448034500345103452034550345603457034580346103462034640346503466034670347003602036040360803609

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 Cheshire County

Cheshire County shares a land border with 5 county equivalents, including 3 in Vermont and Massachusetts. It has more land than 2 of them. The largest neighbor is Worcester County (1,510.7 mi²) and the smallest is Sullivan County (537.9 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Cheshire County forms a block of 5,117 mi² of land, of which it holds 13.8%.

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

Cheshire County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.5 times as much. New Hampshire’s county land could hold about 13 areas the size of Cheshire County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 26.6 miles (42.8 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 Cheshire County?

Cheshire County has more land than 1,917 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 Cheshire County at #1,326 nationally by total area, 21 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 3%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 1.9 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 Cheshire 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.