Vernon County area

Population and density of Vernon County

The Census Bureau estimates that 31,443 people lived in Vernon County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #1,445 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #42 of 72 in Wisconsin. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 30,710, the population has grown by 733 (+2.4%), compared with +1.3% for Wisconsin as a whole.

With 791.6 square miles of land, that is 40 people per square mile (15 per km²), placing Vernon County #1,760 nationally for density and #43 in Wisconsin. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the Wisconsin median is 51. Put another way, there are about 16 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 Vernon County

Vernon County is divided into 33 cities and towns. In Wisconsin, county subdivisions are local governments, and together they cover all of the county’s land and residents.

The most populous is Viroqua city, with 4,435 residents (14.1% of the county). The largest by land is Franklin town, at 51.5 mi², or 6.5% of the county’s land. Among those with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, Clinton town grew fastest since then (+7%).

Population: U.S. Census Bureau Vintage 2025 subcounty estimates, counting only the part of each subdivision inside Vernon County. Land: 2026 Census Gazetteer. How communities are listed.

Metropolitan area

Vernon County is an outlying county of the La Crosse-Onalaska, WI-MN Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its 3 county equivalents have 171,182 residents on 1,795.5 square miles of land; Vernon County accounts for 44.1% of the land and 18.4% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #176 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #265 by population. It belongs to the La Crosse-Onalaska-Sparta, WI-MN Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

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

539295396854619546215462354624546285463254634546385463954651546525465554658546645466554667

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 Vernon County

Vernon County shares a land border with 8 county equivalents, including 2 in Minnesota and Iowa. It has more land than 6 of them. The largest neighbor is Monroe County (900.9 mi²) and the smallest is La Crosse County (451.8 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Vernon County forms a block of 6,091.1 mi² of land, of which it holds 13%.

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

Vernon County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 1.3 times as much. Wisconsin’s county land could hold about 68 areas the size of Vernon County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 28.1 miles (45.3 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 Vernon County?

Vernon County has more land than 2,136 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 Vernon County at #1,141 nationally by total area, 55 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 3%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 1.9 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 Vernon 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.