Cibola County area

Population and density of Cibola County

The Census Bureau estimates that 26,807 people lived in Cibola County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,589 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #16 of 33 in New Mexico. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 27,046, the population has declined by 239 (−0.9%), compared with +0.4% for New Mexico as a whole.

With 4,540 square miles of land, that is 5.9 people per square mile (2.3 per km²), placing Cibola County #2,807 nationally for density and #19 in New Mexico. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the New Mexico median is 6.9. Put another way, there are about 108 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 Cibola County

2 incorporated places lie at least partly in Cibola County. Together they are home to 11,401 people (42.5%); the other 15,406 (57.5%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Grants city, with 8,933 residents in the county. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Milan village grew fastest since then (+0.4%).

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

Metropolitan area

Cibola County is not part of any metropolitan or micropolitan statistical area in the Office of Management and Budget’s July 2023 delineation; 1,306 other county equivalents are also outside one. These areas are built around an urban core of at least 10,000 people plus the counties tied to it by commuting, so counties outside them are generally rural.

ZIP codes

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

8700587007870148702087021870268703487038870408704587049870518731587321873238732787357

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 Cibola County

Cibola County shares a land border with 7 county equivalents, including 1 in Arizona. It has more land than 3 of them. The largest neighbor is Apache County (11,198.4 mi²) and the smallest is Valencia County (1,066.7 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Cibola County forms a block of 40,698.6 mi² of land, of which it holds 11.2%.

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

Cibola County has more land than 2 of the 50 states. It is about 2.3 times the land area of Delaware (1,948.6 mi²), while Connecticut, the next larger state, has 1.1 times as much land (4,842.5 mi²). New Mexico’s county land could hold about 27 areas the size of Cibola County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 67.4 miles (108.4 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 Cibola County?

Cibola County has more land than 3,123 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 Cibola County at #106 nationally by total area, 7 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 Cibola 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.