State rankings
Factual rankings of the 50 states, all from official sources: population and area from the Census Bureau, statehood dates from the states and Congress, and capital populations from the Census Bureau's city estimates. Each ranking explains what stands out, and every table can be sorted. Two related comparisons, how many states each state borders and how many official symbols each has, are listed too.
- States by population
California has the most people, 39,355,309; Wyoming the fewest.
- States by area
Alaska is the largest, at 665,384 square miles; Rhode Island the smallest.
- Population density
New Jersey is the most crowded, with 1,298 people per square mile; Alaska the emptiest.
- Order of statehood
From Delaware in 1787 to Hawaii in 1959.
- Capitals by population
Phoenix is the largest capital, with 1,665,481 people.
- Bordering states
How many states each state borders, from none to eight.
- Official symbols by state
Which states have the most official symbols, and which the fewest.
Why only these rankings
We rank what can be measured and checked: how many people live in each state, how much land and water it covers, how crowded it is, when it joined the Union and how big its capital is. We do not publish “best state” rankings, which depend on choices about what to weigh and are better left to the reader.
How to read the tables
Every ranking table can be sorted by clicking a column heading, so you can, for example, reorder the population table by growth since 2020 or the area table by share of water. Ranks are based on the exact figures, so two states that look tied after rounding still have a definite order. Each ranking page explains where its numbers come from and how current they are; population figures are updated when the Census Bureau releases a new set of estimates each year.
Questions people ask
- Which is the biggest state?
- By area, Alaska, at about 665,000 square miles. By population, California, with about 39.4 million people in 2025.
- Which is the smallest state?
- By area, Rhode Island, at about 1,545 square miles. By population, Wyoming, with about 589,000 people.
- Where do these numbers come from?
- Population figures are the Census Bureau's estimates for July 1, 2025. Areas are the Census Bureau's state area measurements, which include inland, coastal and Great Lakes water.