Yakima County area

Population and density of Yakima County

The Census Bureau estimates that 259,185 people lived in Yakima County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #285 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #8 of 39 in Washington. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 256,729, the population has grown by 2,456 (+1%), compared with +3.8% for Washington as a whole.

With 4,294.5 square miles of land, that is 60 people per square mile (23 per km²), placing Yakima County #1,381 nationally for density and #16 in Washington. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Washington median is 39. Put another way, there are about 11 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 Yakima County

14 incorporated places lie at least partly in Yakima County. Together they are home to 171,356 people (66.1%); the other 87,829 (33.9%) live outside any incorporated place, in unincorporated communities and rural areas.

The largest is Yakima city, with 97,458 residents in the county. Among places with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Tieton city grew fastest since then (+19.7%).

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

Metropolitan area

Yakima County is a central county of the Yakima, WA Metropolitan Statistical Area. Yakima County is the area’s only county equivalent, so the metro area has the same 4,294.5 square miles of land. By combined land it ranks #64 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #195 by population.

ZIP codes

22 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Yakima County; 20 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

98901989029890398908989219892398930989329893398935989369893798938989399894298944989479894898951989529895399350

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 Yakima County

Yakima County shares a land border with 7 county equivalents. It has more land than every one of them. The largest neighbor is Grant County (2,679.6 mi²) and the smallest is Skamania County (1,658.3 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Yakima County forms a block of 18,572.2 mi² of land, of which it holds 23.1%.

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

Yakima County has more land than 2 of the 50 states. It is about 2.2 times the land area of Delaware (1,948.6 mi²), while Connecticut, the next larger state, has 1.1 times as much land (4,842.5 mi²). Washington’s county land could hold about 15 areas the size of Yakima County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 65.5 miles (105.5 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 Yakima County?

Yakima County has more land than 3,115 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 Yakima County at #116 nationally by total area, 9 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 0.4%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 0.8 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 Yakima 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.