how big is laurel mississippi

Laurel, Mississippi is a relatively small city, both in land area and population size, but it anchors a much larger surrounding micropolitan region.

Quick Scoop: How big is Laurel, Mississippi?

• The city of Laurel covers about 16.24 square miles of land, plus about 0.3 square miles of water.

• That’s roughly 16.5 square miles total within the official city limits.

• Recent estimates put the city population at around 17,000–19,000 people, depending on the year and source.

• Laurel is also the core of the Laurel, MS micropolitan area , which spans about 1,370–1,377 square miles across Jasper and Jones counties, with a population of roughly 80,000–85,000 people.

City vs. Micropolitan Area

Here’s how the “size” looks from two angles:

html

<table>
  <tr>
    <th>Area</th>
    <th>What it covers</th>
    <th>Land size</th>
    <th>Population (approx.)</th>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td>Laurel city</td>
    <td>Official city limits</td>
    <td>16.24 sq mi land, 0.3 sq mi water[web:5][web:9]</td>
    <td>About 17k–19k residents[web:5][web:7][web:9]</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td>Laurel micropolitan area</td>
    <td>Wider region (Jasper & Jones counties)</td>
    <td>About 1,371–1,377 sq mi total[web:1][web:3][web:7]</td>
    <td>About 80k–85k residents[web:1][web:3][web:7]</td>
  </tr>
</table>

A quick mental picture

If you’re thinking in everyday terms, the city of Laurel is about the size of a small town that you can drive across in 15–20 minutes, but it serves as a hub for a much larger rural region that stretches over more than a thousand square miles.

In short, if you mean “how big is Laurel, Mississippi?” by the city limits, it’s a compact city of about 16 square miles, but if you mean the wider area that looks to Laurel as its center, you’re talking about a region nearly the size of a small U.S. county.

TL;DR: Laurel the city ≈ 16 square miles and ~17k–19k people; Laurel’s wider micropolitan area ≈ 1,370+ square miles and ~80k–85k people.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.