Greater Minnesota’s population trends weren’t great in the 2010s.
Most areas outside the seven-county Twin Cities metro had net losses from 2010 to 2019. Deaths outweighed births, more people were moving out than moving in, or both.
Not to say the 2020s have been all rosy, but census data did show an “interesting trend of growth” in Greater Minnesota, said researcher Marnie Werner.
“The old narrative of rural Minnesota dying is simply not true, and we’ve been seeing that for at least six years now,” said Werner, of the Center for Rural Policy and Development.
The center, in its annual State of Rural Minnesota report, found only 19 of 80 counties in Greater Minnesota lost population from 2020 to 2024. It was a marked decrease from 46 net-loss counties from 2010 to 2019.
Combined, the counties had an average growth rate of 1.5% in the 2020s, a reversal from a -0.5% average decline in the 2010s. But growth rates weren’t uniform across regions, so let’s take a look at which areas saw the biggest population upticks and downturns.
Where were the biggest population gains?
We’ll start in the “exurbs,” those areas abutting outer-ring suburbs of the seven-county Twin Cities metro area. Three of the five counties with the biggest population increases by percentage fit in this group:
- Wright County: 8.7% (1st out of 87 total counties)
- Isanti County: 6.5% (3rd)
- Sherburne County: 4.7% (9th)
All of them are located northwest or north of Minneapolis. And even though they’re not counted as Twin Cities metro counties, they’re certainly close enough for commuters to hold down metro jobs.
About 44,000 people do just that in Wright County, according to the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development. Sherburne County, meanwhile, sends about 27,500 workers to the Twin Cities.
Exurban growth coincided with continued gains in the suburbs. Washington, Carver, Scott and Anoka counties, all part of the seven-county metro, finished among the top 10 in population growth.
Shifts like this are typically tied to costs, Werner said.
“It usually has to do with housing costs, school districts, quality of life, the kind of things that they feel they’re not getting in the core urban counties,” Werner said.
Movement of that kind isn’t new. These counties shouldn’t be seen as comeback stories, but rather as counties that grew in the 2010s and kept growing in the 2020s.
Likewise, most counties with larger population centers in Greater Minnesota had continued gains from 2010 to 2024. These places and their hub cities include Olmsted (Rochester), Stearns (St. Cloud), Clay (Moorhead) and Blue Earth (Mankato).
Among other groupings, the report noted population increases in counties considered recreational, notably the central lakes area of Minnesota, and counties with high percentages of non-white residents. Southwest Minnesota’s Nobles and Watonwan counties, two counties with the highest percentage of Hispanic, Black or Indigenous residents, were part of broad growth in southern Minnesota counties.
What’s happening in areas with population declines?
Migration tends to be the image in people’s heads when they think of population declines, said Susan Brower, Minnesota’s state demographer. We can easily picture people leaving an area after job lay offs, or young people moving away and never coming back.
Yes, those scenarios do happen. Often, though, declines don’t play out that way.
“It’s not the exodus people imagine,” she said. “It might not be a magnet for migrations, but just looking at population declines, a lot of it is just happening from people living their everyday lives and living and dying in these communities.”
She’s referring to natural change, simple math measuring the difference between births and deaths. It’s a good baseline to start from when analyzing population trends, she said.
If a county doesn’t have more births than deaths, and doesn’t have more in migration than out- migration, it can’t grow. In northwest Minnesota, the balance between natural change and migration isn’t landing in the positive, giving the region eight of the nine counties with the biggest declines in the 2020s:
- Marshall County: -4.7%
- Kittson County: -4.4%
- Koochiching County: -4.2
- Clearwater County: -2.9
- Mahnomen County: -2.7
- Pennington County: -2.3
- Red Lake County: -2.2
- Polk County: -2.2
“This is happening across Minnesota,” Brower said of low birth rates. “But the counter to it is in migration from other places and I think that’s what we see less of in northern Minnesota and northwestern Minnesota.”
Polk County’s administrator, Chuck Whiting, has wondered about the area’s population decline. He knows the county’s older population is a factor.
“But sometimes it’s not just an obvious thing for numbers like that,” he said.
Enrollment came to his mind, what with Polk County having University of Minnesota Crookston and Northland Community and Technical College in East Grand Forks. Based on the numbers, he might be on to something here.
While the institutions boasted big enrollment numbers in fall 2025, they declined during years measured in the center’s report. Given the bounce backs this academic year, perhaps Polk County will rebound as well in population when someone next crunches the numbers.
Across the broader northwest region, Bethany Wesley sees trends like this as a reflection of whether people believe they can build a life somewhere.
“That comes down to housing and child care,” said Wesley, senior vice president of advancement at the Northwest Minnesota Foundation. “In our region in particular, those issues are deeply connected. If one is missing, it affects if people are going to stay.”
It further ties into business decisions. A company may want to grow, but there needs to be enough housing to accommodate a bigger workforce.
Post-pandemic workers needed in Greater Minnesota
Apart from population shifts, job vacancies were the other main theme in the center’s report, Werner said. Greater Minnesota had the highest job vacancy rates.
“Job vacancies really have dropped from the pandemic, but in Greater Minnesota at least they’re still above where they should be, which means there are empty jobs out there,” she said.
To address these issues, Wesley’s foundation keys in on area needs for housing and child care, including through a housing program known as Northstar Neighbors. The region has stakeholders working together to make it a place more people can call home, she said.
“Everything we do is in partnership,” she said. “That’s one of the great things about our region is everyone is at the table.”
