DFW is growing leaps and bounds. But the biggest changes aren’t around Fort Worth
Dallas-Fort Worth can no longer claim to be leading the nation’s metropolitan areas in population growth, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s latest estimates.
Perhaps to the added chagrin of some Tarrant County residents, much of DFW’s most intense growth spurts are taking place around Dallas, not Fort Worth.
Tarrant County, in absolute terms, absorbed 114,411 new residents between 2020 and 2024, the Census estimates, the third largest population change in that time frame (behind only Denton and Collin counties). Tarrant County experienced the second largest population bump in the Metroplex between 2023 and 2024, trailing only Collin.
Collin and other Dallas-adjacent counties are experiencing the sharpest population jumps by percentage. Only Wise County kept pace with its eastern peers between 2023 and 2024.
Business activity and ample room for homebuilding are luring people to Dallas’ northern, eastern, and southern outskirts.
The intensity of year-over-year population change across the Metroplex seems, on the whole, to be easing. Growth rates in some counties, like Collin and Wise, have remained more or less steady over the past four years; others, like Parker and Kaufman, documented slight but noticeable declines.
