Columbus County area

Population and density of Columbus County

The Census Bureau estimates that 50,487 people lived in Columbus County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,020 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #52 of 100 in North Carolina. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 50,630, the population has declined by 143 (−0.3%), compared with +7.2% for North Carolina as a whole.

With 938.1 square miles of land, that is 54 people per square mile (21 per km²), placing Columbus County #1,481 nationally for density and #80 in North Carolina. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the North Carolina median is 116. Put another way, there are about 12 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 Columbus County

10 incorporated places lie at least partly in Columbus County. Together they are home to 14,292 people (28.3%); the other 36,195 (71.7%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Whiteville city, with 4,765 residents in the county. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Tabor City town grew fastest since then (+2.4%).

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

Metropolitan area

Columbus 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

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

28320284232842428430284312843228433284362843828439284422845028455284562846328472

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 Columbus County

Columbus County shares a land border with 5 county equivalents, including 1 in South Carolina. It has more land than 3 of them. The largest neighbor is Horry County (1,133.1 mi²) and the smallest is Brunswick County (849.5 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Columbus County forms a block of 5,614.3 mi² of land, of which it holds 16.7%.

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

Columbus County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.1 times as much. North Carolina’s county land could hold about 52 areas the size of Columbus County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 30.6 miles (49.3 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 Columbus County?

Columbus County has more land than 2,463 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 Columbus County at #836 nationally by total area, 77 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 Columbus 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.