Top 10 Fastest-Growing Cities In Colorado: See The List

COLORADO — Denver is the fastest-growing city in Colorado, according to newly released 2020 census data.

The U.S. Census Bureau on Thursday released new statistics that illustrate population changes for the nation, states and communities down to the block level. The data, which shows an increase in the population of the nation’s metro areas compared to a decade ago, also shows population changes in smaller cities.

The data represents where people were living as of April 1, 2020.

These are the top 10 fastest growing cities by number of residents added since 2010, according to the census data:

1. Denver grew by 115,364 people; 2020 population: 715,522
2. Colorado Springs grew by 62,534 people; 2020 population: 478,961
3. Aurora grew by 61,183 people; 2020 population: 386,261
4. Fort Collins grew by 25,824 people; 2020 population: 169,810
5. Castle Rock grew by 24,927 people; 2020 population: 73,158
6. Thornton grew by 23,095 people; 2020 population: 141,867
7. Broomfield grew by 18,223 people; 2020 population: 74,112
8. Arvada grew by 17,969 people; 2020 population: 124,402
9. Commerce City grew by 16,505 residents; 2020 population: 62,418
10. Greeley grew by 15,906 residents; 2020 population: 108,795

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The top 10 by percentage growth are:

1. Broomfield: 32.6 percent
2. Weld: 30.1 percent
3. Douglas: 25.4 percent
4. Mineral: 21.5 percent
5. Larimer: 19.8 percent
6. Denver: 19.2 percent
7. Larimer: 19.8 percent
8. Adams: 17.7 percent
9. El Paso: 17.4 percent
10. Elbert: 12.9 percent

Colorado grew by 744,518 residents between the 2010 and 2020 census. Our state ranked 6th in the nation for growth percentage (14.8 percent).

Since the 2010 census, the population of U.S. metro areas has grown by 9 percent. Eighty-six percent of the country’s population was living in metro areas in 2020, compared to 85 percent in 2010.

Metro areas in the south and western United States saw the most growth, according to Marc Perry, a senior demographer at the Census Bureau.

“However, as we’ve been seeing in our annual population estimates, our nation is growing slower than it used to,” Perry said in a news release. “This decline is evident at the local level, where around 52 percent of the counties in the United States saw their 2020 census populations decrease from their 2010 census populations.”

Plenty of cities in Colorado also lost population in the decade between 2010 and 2020. Here are the 10 communities that saw the biggest decrease in population, listed from highest to lowest percentage:

1. Timnath: 937 percent
2. Castle Pines: 205.37 percent
3. Blue Sky: 170.83 percent
4. Trail Side: 166.1 percent
5. Severance: 142.75 percent
6. Berthoud: 102.39 percent
7. Lakeside: 100 percent
8. Deer Trail: 95.6 percent
9. Monument: 88.05 percent
10. Garfield: 80 percent

Here are some other interesting findings from the data:

• The largest city in the United States in 2020 remains New York, with 8.8 million people.

• The largest county in the United States in 2020 remains Los Angeles County, with over 10 million people.

• The fastest-growing U.S. metro area between the 2010 and 2020 censuses was The Villages, FL, which grew 39 percent, from about 93,000 people to about 130,000.

• The U.S. metro areas with the largest declines in population were Pine Bluff, Arkansas, and Danville, Illinois, losing 12.5 percent and 9.1 percent of their populations, respectively.

Read more about the 2020 U.S. Census results.