Orleans County area

Population and density of Orleans County

The Census Bureau estimates that 39,825 people lived in Orleans County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,216 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #54 of 62 in New York. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 40,412, the population has declined by 587 (−1.5%), compared with −1% for New York as a whole.

With 391.3 square miles of land, that is 102 people per square mile (39 per km²), placing Orleans County #975 nationally for density and #35 in New York. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the New York median is 112. Put another way, there are about 6.3 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 Orleans County

Orleans County is divided into 10 cities and towns. In New York, county subdivisions are local governments, and together they cover all of the county’s land and residents.

The most populous is Albion town, with 7,546 residents (18.9% of the county). The largest by land is Barre town, at 55 mi², or 14.1% of the county’s land. Among those with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Gaines town grew fastest since then (+2.4%).

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

Metropolitan area

Orleans County is an outlying county of the Rochester, NY Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 5 county equivalents have 1,056,149 residents on 2,927.7 square miles of land; Orleans County accounts for 13.4% of the land and 3.8% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #101 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #55 by population. It belongs to the Rochester-Batavia-Seneca Falls, NY Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

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

140121405814098141031410514125144111442014422144641447014476144771447914571

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 Orleans County

Orleans County shares a land border with 3 county equivalents. Each of them has more land than Orleans County. The largest neighbor is Monroe County (657 mi²) and the smallest is Genesee County (493 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Orleans County forms a block of 2,063.6 mi² of land, of which it holds 19%.

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

Orleans County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 2.6 times as much. New York’s county land could hold about 120 areas the size of Orleans County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 19.8 miles (31.8 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 Orleans County?

Orleans County has more land than 652 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 Orleans County at #1,139 nationally by total area, 1,431 places closer to the top than its land rank. The water assigned to this geography moves it ahead of some county equivalents with more land.

Its water share is 52.1%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 51 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 Orleans 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.