Pittsburg County area

Population and density of Pittsburg County

The Census Bureau estimates that 43,320 people lived in Pittsburg County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,147 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #24 of 77 in Oklahoma. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 43,777, the population has declined by 457 (−1%), compared with +4.1% for Oklahoma as a whole.

With 1,305.5 square miles of land, that is 33 people per square mile (13 per km²), placing Pittsburg County #1,913 nationally for density and #32 in Oklahoma. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Oklahoma median is 28. Put another way, there are about 19 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 Pittsburg County

14 incorporated places lie at least partly in Pittsburg County. Together they are home to 25,916 people (59.8%); the other 17,404 (40.2%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is McAlester city, with 18,044 residents in the county. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Krebs city grew fastest since then (+0%).

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

Metropolitan area

Pittsburg County is a central county of the McAlester, OK Micropolitan Statistical Area. Pittsburg County is the area’s only county equivalent, so the micro area has the same 1,305.5 square miles of land. By combined land it ranks #129 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #290 by population.

ZIP codes

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

74425744307443274442744627450174522745287453674546745477455274553745547456074561745657457074576

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 Pittsburg County

Pittsburg County shares a land border with 7 county equivalents. It has more land than 6 of them. The largest neighbor is Pushmataha County (1,395.6 mi²) and the smallest is Coal County (516.8 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Pittsburg County forms a block of 6,914.9 mi² of land, of which it holds 18.9%.

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

Pittsburg County has more land than 1 of the 50 states. It is about 1.3 times the land area of Rhode Island (1,033.9 mi²), while Delaware, the next larger state, has 1.5 times as much land (1,948.6 mi²). Oklahoma’s county land could hold about 53 areas the size of Pittsburg County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 36.1 miles (58.1 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 Pittsburg County?

Pittsburg County has more land than 2,763 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 Pittsburg County at #498 nationally by total area, 39 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 5.3%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 4.1 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 Pittsburg 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.