Cotton County area

Population and density of Cotton County

The Census Bureau estimates that 5,432 people lived in Cotton County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #2,860 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #67 of 77 in Oklahoma. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 5,527, the population has declined by 95 (−1.7%), compared with +4.1% for Oklahoma as a whole.

With 632.6 square miles of land, that is 8.6 people per square mile (3.3 per km²), placing Cotton County #2,696 nationally for density and #61 in Oklahoma. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Oklahoma median is 28. Put another way, there are about 75 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 Cotton County

4 incorporated places lie at least partly in Cotton County. Together they are home to 3,577 people (65.9%); the other 1,855 (34.1%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Walters city, with 2,355 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Cotton County is an outlying county of the Lawton, OK Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 127,590 residents on 1,702 square miles of land; Cotton County accounts for 37.2% of the land and 4.3% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #188 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #329 by population. It belongs to the Lawton-Duncan, OK Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

11 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Cotton County; 5 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

7352873529735317353373540735437354673548735627356873572

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 Cotton County

Cotton County shares a land border with 6 county equivalents, including 2 in Texas. It has more land than 1 of them. The largest neighbor is Clay County (1,088.8 mi²) and the smallest is Wichita County (627.6 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Cotton County forms a block of 5,918.6 mi² of land, of which it holds 10.7%.

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

Cotton County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.6 times as much. Oklahoma’s county land could hold about 108 areas the size of Cotton County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 25.2 miles (40.5 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 Cotton County?

Cotton County has more land than 1,710 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 Cotton County at #1,603 nationally by total area, 91 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 1.4%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.3 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 Cotton 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.