Metropolitan areas in the United States saw year-to-year growth that outpaces the country as a whole, mostly backed by international migration to those parts of the country.
After populations in several metropolitan areas took a dip during the pandemic earlier this decade, 2024 was a boon for populations across the densely populated areas. Census Bureau data released Thursday showed that there was a positive net international migration from 2023 to 2024 in all 387 metro areas nationwide.
Population overall grew in roughly 90% of the metro areas across the country year to year, 341 out of 387, compared to only 317 metro areas seeing population growth from 2022 to 2023.
“Increasingly, population growth in metro areas is being shaped by international migration,” Kristie Wilder, a demographer in the Census Bureau’s Population Division, said in a statement. “While births continue to contribute to overall growth, rising net international migration is offsetting the ongoing net domestic outmigration we see in many of these areas.”
The Washington-Arlington-Alexandria metropolitan area was one region that lost population during the pandemic but has since experienced population gains. Washington, D.C., surpassed a population of 700,000 people in 2024 for the first time since 2019.
Southern states, including Florida, Texas, Alabama, and South Carolina, had some of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas, with areas in that region making up nine of the 10 fastest-growing metro areas by percentage growth from 2023 to 2024.
DC POPULATION PASSES 700,000 FOR FIRST TIME IN FIVE YEARS: CENSUS BUREAU
The fastest-growing metro area was Ocala, Florida, growing by 4% from 2023 to 2024, followed by the Panama City-Panama City Beach, Florida, area growing by 3.8% year to year, and the Myrtle Beach-Conway-North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, area growing by 3.8% year to year.
The survey from the bureau found that 86.4% of the country’s population lived in metro areas in 2024 and that the overall population living in metro areas was roughly 293.9 million people.
