Potter County area

Population and density of Potter County

The Census Bureau estimates that 114,453 people lived in Potter County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #567 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #43 of 254 in Texas. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 118,622, the population has declined by 4,169 (−3.5%), compared with +8.8% for Texas as a whole.

With 908.4 square miles of land, that is 126 people per square mile (49 per km²), placing Potter County #848 nationally for density and #43 in Texas. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Texas median is 22. Put another way, there are about 5.1 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 Potter County

2 incorporated places lie at least partly in Potter County. Together they are home to 98,704 people (86.2%); the other 15,749 (13.8%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Amarillo city, with 98,509 residents in the county (the city extends into 1 other county).

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

Metropolitan area

Potter County is a central county of the Amarillo, TX Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 5 county equivalents have 276,235 residents on 5,151 square miles of land; Potter County accounts for 17.6% of the land and 41.4% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #49 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #186 by population. It belongs to the Amarillo-Borger, TX Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

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

7901079036790587906879098791017910279103791047910679107791087910979111791187912179124

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 Potter County

Potter County shares a land border with 4 county equivalents. It has more land than 1 of them. The largest neighbor is Oldham County (1,500.5 mi²) and the smallest is Moore County (899.7 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Potter County forms a block of 5,141.6 mi² of land, of which it holds 17.7%.

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

Potter County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.1 times as much. Texas’s county land could hold about 288 areas the size of Potter County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 30.1 miles (48.5 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 Potter County?

Potter County has more land than 2,396 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 Potter County at #897 nationally by total area, 71 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 1.5%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.3 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 Potter 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.