Edmunds County area

Population and density of Edmunds County

The Census Bureau estimates that 4,022 people lived in Edmunds County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #2,963 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #41 of 66 in South Dakota. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 3,981, the population has grown by 41 (+1%), compared with +5.5% for South Dakota as a whole.

With 1,126 square miles of land, that is 3.6 people per square mile (1.4 per km²), placing Edmunds County #2,940 nationally for density and #45 in South Dakota. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the South Dakota median is 5.7. Put another way, there are about 179 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 Edmunds County

4 incorporated places lie at least partly in Edmunds County. Together they are home to 1,847 people (45.9%); the other 2,175 (54.1%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Ipswich city, with 935 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Edmunds County is an outlying county of the Aberdeen, SD Micropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 41,583 residents on 2,839 square miles of land; Edmunds County accounts for 39.7% of the land and 9.7% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #54 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #309 by population.

ZIP codes

10 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Edmunds County; 3 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

57428574355744857451574565746057466574715747557481

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 Edmunds County

Edmunds County shares a land border with 5 county equivalents. It has more land than 3 of them. The largest neighbor is Brown County (1,713 mi²) and the smallest is Walworth County (707.5 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Edmunds County forms a block of 6,526 mi² of land, of which it holds 17.3%.

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

Edmunds County has more land than 1 of the 50 states. It is about 1.1 times the land area of Rhode Island (1,033.9 mi²), while Delaware, the next larger state, has 1.7 times as much land (1,948.6 mi²). South Dakota’s county land could hold about 67 areas the size of Edmunds County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 33.6 miles (54 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 Edmunds County?

Edmunds County has more land than 2,665 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 Edmunds County at #623 nationally by total area, 66 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 2.2%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 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 Edmunds 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.