Hale County area

Population and density of Hale County

The Census Bureau estimates that 31,819 people lived in Hale County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,434 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #92 of 254 in Texas. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 32,523, the population has declined by 704 (−2.2%), compared with +8.8% for Texas as a whole.

With 1,004.7 square miles of land, that is 32 people per square mile (12 per km²), placing Hale County #1,954 nationally for density and #105 in Texas. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Texas median is 22. Put another way, there are about 20 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 Hale County

5 incorporated places lie at least partly in Hale County. Together they are home to 24,482 people (76.9%); the other 7,337 (23.1%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Plainview city, with 19,314 residents in the county.

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

Metropolitan area

Hale County is a central county of the Plainview, TX Micropolitan Statistical Area. Its 2 county equivalents have 36,700 residents on 1,996.8 square miles of land; Hale County accounts for 50.3% of the land and 86.7% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #79 of 542 micropolitan areas, and #370 by population. It belongs to the Lubbock-Plainview, TX Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

10 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Hale County; 7 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

79021790327904179043790527906479072790737925079311

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 Hale County

Hale County shares a land border with 5 county equivalents. It has more land than 4 of them. The largest neighbor is Lamb County (1,016.2 mi²) and the smallest is Swisher County (890.2 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Hale County forms a block of 5,693.3 mi² of land, of which it holds 17.6%.

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

Hale 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 times as much. Texas’s county land could hold about 260 areas the size of Hale County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 31.7 miles (51 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 Hale County?

Hale County has more land than 2,547 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 Hale County at #768 nationally by total area, 93 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%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 1.2 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 Hale 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.