Pasquotank County area

Population and density of Pasquotank County

The Census Bureau estimates that 42,201 people lived in Pasquotank County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,169 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #61 of 100 in North Carolina. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 40,569, the population has grown by 1,632 (+4%), compared with +7.2% for North Carolina as a whole.

With 226.9 square miles of land, that is 186 people per square mile (72 per km²), placing Pasquotank County #668 nationally for density and #30 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 3.4 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 Pasquotank County

1 incorporated place lies at least partly in Pasquotank County. Together they are home to 19,582 people (46.4%); the other 22,619 (53.6%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Elizabeth City city, with 19,582 residents in the county (the city extends into 1 other county).

Metropolitan area

Pasquotank County is a central county of the Elizabeth City, NC Micropolitan Statistical Area. Pasquotank County is the area’s only county equivalent, so the micro area has the same 226.9 square miles of land. By combined land it ranks #532 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #300 by population. It belongs to the Virginia Beach-Chesapeake, VA-NC Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

1 ZIP Code Tabulation Area has land in Pasquotank County, and it lies mostly inside the county.

27909

ZIP Code Tabulation Areas are the Census Bureau’s approximations of USPS ZIP Code service areas, from the 2020 Census relationship files. Post-office-box and single-address ZIP Codes have no tabulation area.

Counties bordering Pasquotank County

Pasquotank County shares a land border with 3 county equivalents. Each of them has more land than Pasquotank County. The largest neighbor is Gates County (340.6 mi²) and the smallest is Camden County (240.3 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Pasquotank County forms a block of 1,055 mi² of land, of which it holds 21.5%.

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

Pasquotank County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 4.6 times as much. North Carolina’s county land could hold about 214 areas the size of Pasquotank County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 15.1 miles (24.2 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 Pasquotank County?

Pasquotank County has more land than 263 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 Pasquotank County at #2,863 nationally by total area, 96 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 21.6%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 20.4 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 Pasquotank 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.