Use data files to identify rural areas
We created these data files to assist researchers, government agencies, and the public by providing different ways to identify and analyze rural areas.
Do these files replace the Eligibility Analyzer?
These files do not replace the use of the Rural Health Grants Eligibility Analyzer for determination of eligibility for Rural Health Grants.
What is in these data files?
The County and Census Tract Excel file (XLSX - 4 MB) contains the same data that are used for the Rural Health Grants Eligibility Analyzer. The file consists of three parts:
- A data dictionary that describes the contents of the file and the data sources
- A list of 2023 U.S. counties
- A list of 2020 U.S. census tracts
Information about the list of 2023 U.S. counties:
- We consider counties fully rural when they meet at least one of the following criteria:
- They are non-core counties (neither metro nor micro using the OMB delineation)
- They are micropolitan counties
- They are outlying metro counties with no population from an urban area of 50,000 or more people
- All census tracts in the county are FORHP rural
- The file identifies fully rural counties as 'Fully FORHP Rural' in the County_Eligibility variable. The file identifies all other counties as ‘Not fully FORHP rural’.
- Note:
- This file includes rural areas in Puerto Rico and the U.S. territories. 'NA' is used when a territory does not have a county FIPS code.
- This file includes 2023 counties to use the most recent OMB update and to include new Connecticut Planning regions. We matched 2020 census tracts to 2023 counties in order to do this. This is our best estimate, but note that discrepancies are possible.
- See the census tract section to identify counties that are partially rural.
Information about the list of 2020 U.S. census tracts:
- We consider census tracts to be rural when they meet at least one of the following criteria:
- Census tracts in fully rural counties (see county criteria in the previous section)
- Census tracts with Rural Urban Commuting Area (RUCA) codes 4-10 in metropolitan counties
- Census tracts of at least 400 square miles in area with population density of 35 or fewer people per square mile with RUCA codes 2-3 in metropolitan counties
- Census tracts with RRS 5 and RUCA codes 2-3 that are at least 20 square miles in area in metropolitan counties
- Using the FORHP_Rural variable the file identifies rural census tracts as 'Yes' and tracts that are not rural as 'No'.
- Note:
- This file includes rural areas in Puerto Rico and the U.S. territories. 'NA' is used when a territory does not have a county or tract FIPS code.
- This file includes 2023 counties to use the most recent OMB update and to include new Connecticut Planning regions. We matched 2020 census tracts to 2023 counties in order to do this. This is our best estimate, but note that discrepancies are possible.
- This file includes census tracts that are in fully rural counties. It includes all census tracts in the U.S., both tracts identified as rural and tracts that are not rural.
The ZIP Code Approximation Excel file (XLSX - 604 KB) is based on the census tract data. We used the following methods to crosswalk the rural census tracts to ZIP Codes to create this file.
- We downloaded the ZIP Code Tabulation Area (ZCTA) – Census Tract relationship file from the Missouri Census Data Center. We added the FORHP rural variable, linking on census tract. We summed the population count of rural census tracts and not rural census tracts for each ZCTA. We selected the rural status with the higher population count as the FORHP rural approximation for each ZCTA.
- We used a HRSA ZCTA-ZIP code crosswalk to create a list of ZIP codes with FORHP Rural approximations. Some ZIP code points are not included in the ZCTA files. For these, we geocoded the points and identified whether they intersected with a FORHP Rural Health area, then we added them to the final list of FORHP Rural ZIP Code approximations.
When did FORHP update these data files?
In September 2025, we updated the data files on this page using 2020 census tracts. We made the following updates:
- We used the Rural Urban Commuting Area (RUCA) codes from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service (ERS) (updated July-August 2025).
- We used the Road Ruggedness Scale (RRS) from the USDA ERS (updated August 2025).
These updates are in addition to the changes we made in November 2024 when we made the following updates:
- We used the metropolitan (metro) and micropolitan (micro) county delineations in OMB Bulletin No. 23-01 (bidenwhitehouse.archives.gov) (PDF - 1 MB).
- We used the 2020 Census Urban Areas (updated July 2023) to identify outlying metro counties with no population from an urban area of 50,000 or more people as described in the 2024 Federal Register Notice, Inclusion of Terrain Factors in the Definition of Rural Area for Federal Office of Rural Health Policy Grants.
- We used the Road Ruggedness Scale for 2010 census tracts (updated August 2023) developed by the USDA ERS to identify census tracts that are rural because their roads are highly rugged as described in the 2024 Federal Register Notice, Inclusion of Terrain Factors in the Definition of Rural Area for Federal Office of Rural Health Policy Grants.
Please contact us at the following email address with questions about rural data files.
Contact us
Email: RuralPolicy@hrsa.gov
Call: 301-443-0835