Bradley County area

Population and density of Bradley County

The Census Bureau estimates that 115,465 people lived in Bradley County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #563 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #14 of 95 in Tennessee. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 108,620, the population has grown by 6,845 (+6.3%), compared with +5.8% for Tennessee as a whole.

With 328.8 square miles of land, that is 351 people per square mile (136 per km²), placing Bradley County #452 nationally for density and #12 in Tennessee. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Tennessee median is 76. Put another way, there are about 1.8 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 Bradley County

2 incorporated places lie at least partly in Bradley County. Together they are home to 52,095 people (45.1%); the other 63,370 (54.9%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Cleveland city, with 51,172 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Bradley County is a central county of the Cleveland, TN Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 134,057 residents on 763.4 square miles of land; Bradley County accounts for 43.1% of the land and 86.1% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #311 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #314 by population. It belongs to the Chattanooga-Cleveland-Dalton, TN-GA-AL Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

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

3730737310373113731237323373363735337362

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 Bradley County

Bradley County shares a land border with 6 county equivalents, including 2 in Georgia. It has more land than 2 of them. The largest neighbor is Hamilton County (542.2 mi²) and the smallest is Meigs County (195.1 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Bradley County forms a block of 2,565.7 mi² of land, of which it holds 12.8%.

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

Bradley County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 3.1 times as much. Tennessee’s county land could hold about 125 areas the size of Bradley County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 18.1 miles (29.2 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 Bradley County?

Bradley County has more land than 481 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 Bradley County at #2,780 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 0.8%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.4 percentage points lower. 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 Bradley 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.