Hughes County area

Population and density of Hughes County

The Census Bureau estimates that 17,570 people lived in Hughes County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #2,018 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #12 of 66 in South Dakota. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 17,769, the population has declined by 199 (−1.1%), compared with +5.5% for South Dakota as a whole.

With 741.5 square miles of land, that is 24 people per square mile (9.1 per km²), placing Hughes County #2,180 nationally for density and #11 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 27 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 Hughes County

3 incorporated places lie at least partly in Hughes County. Together they are home to 14,274 people (81.2%); the other 3,296 (18.8%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Pierre city, with 13,848 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Hughes County is a central county of the Pierre, SD Micropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 20,588 residents on 2,186 square miles of land; Hughes County accounts for 33.9% of the land and 85.3% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #72 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #511 by population.

ZIP codes

3 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Hughes County, and each lies mostly inside the county.

575015752257536

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 Hughes County

Hughes County shares a land border with 4 county equivalents. Each of them has more land than Hughes County. The largest neighbor is Lyman County (1,642.3 mi²) and the smallest is Hyde County (860.6 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Hughes County forms a block of 5,695.6 mi² of land, of which it holds 13%.

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

Hughes County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.4 times as much. South Dakota’s county land could hold about 102 areas the size of Hughes County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 27.2 miles (43.8 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 Hughes County?

Hughes County has more land than 2,031 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 Hughes County at #1,179 nationally by total area, 12 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 7.4%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 6.2 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 Hughes 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.