Yavapai County, Arizona

Yavapai County is a county in Arizona, United States, in the state’s central highlands about 90 miles north of Phoenix. It had a population of 236,209 at the 2020 census, an estimated 252,552 by 2024, and covers 8,123 square miles (21,040 km2) of land centred near 34°34′N 112°32′W.

Prescott is the county seat; its postal code is 86301. The county holds 3 cities, 7 towns and dozens of unincorporated communities and census-designated places, and it runs on Mountain time year-round — Arizona does not observe daylight saving. Its FIPS code is 04025.

Towns & Villages in Yavapai County

Yavapai County has 10 incorporated cities and towns. The table below also covers 11 of the largest census-designated places (CDPs) — communities the Census Bureau recognizes and counts but that have no town government of their own. Dozens of smaller unincorporated localities, mining camps and mobile-home parks exist beyond this list; most have no population count or ZIP code separate from a nearby town.

Two places on this list straddle county lines. Sedona’s population figure above is citywide — historically about seven in ten Sedona residents live on the Yavapai County side of the line, with the rest across the county boundary in Coconino County. Wickenburg runs the opposite way: its town limits sit mostly in Maricopa County, with only the northern edge of the community extending into Yavapai.

ZIP Codes

• 86301 — Prescott (main ZIP; the city also uses 86302–86305 for post office boxes and 86313 for Prescott Valley overlap addresses)
• 86314, 86315 — Prescott Valley
• 86323 — Chino Valley
• 86326 — Cottonwood and Verde Village
• 86322 — Camp Verde
• 86336 — Sedona
• 85358, 85390 — Wickenburg
• 86334 — Paulden
• 86342 — Lake Montezuma (also covers Rimrock and McGuireville)
• 86324 — Clarkdale
• 86329 — Dewey-Humboldt
• 86325 — Cornville
• 85324 — Black Canyon City
• 86333 — Mayer
• 86331 — Jerome
• 86320 — Ash Fork

Village of Oak Creek, Bagdad, Yarnell and Seligman have no ZIP code of their own on record here; mail to those communities is delivered under a nearby town’s code, and this page omits a guessed number rather than state one without a source.

Geography

Yavapai County spans a transition zone between Arizona’s high desert and its central mountains, running from the Bradshaw Mountains and Prescott National Forest in the east down through the Verde Valley and out to the Big Chino and Aguila valleys in the west. Of its 8,123 square miles of land, only about 4.4 square miles are water — there are no large natural lakes, and the Verde River, which rises near Paulden and flows south through Camp Verde, is the county’s principal waterway. Granite Mountain and the San Francisco Peaks foothills mark the county’s northern edge, and the Mogollon Rim runs along part of its eastern boundary with Gila County.

Mohave County lies to the west, La Paz County to the southwest, Maricopa County to the south, Gila County to the southeast, and Coconino County to the north and northeast. Of these five, only Gila County has its own page on this site: Gila County. Mohave, La Paz, Maricopa and Coconino counties do not yet have pages here.

Demographics

Yavapai County had a population of 236,209 at the 2020 census, and the latest estimate puts the county near 252,552 residents, growth driven largely by retirees moving to the Prescott and Verde Valley areas. Prescott Valley and Prescott together hold roughly two in five county residents. Median household income runs about $69,613, below Arizona’s statewide 2023 ACS figure of $77,315 — a gap consistent with the county’s large retired population living on fixed incomes. Population density works out to roughly 29 people per square mile of land, low even by Arizona standards outside the Phoenix and Tucson metro areas.

Economy & Local Life

Health care and social assistance is the county’s largest employment sector at roughly 14,600 workers, followed by retail trade at about 12,700 and construction at about 9,300. Yavapai Regional Medical Center is the largest single employer in the Prescott area, alongside Yavapai County government itself, the Northern Arizona VA Health Care System, Yavapai College and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University’s Prescott campus. In Prescott Valley, MI Windows and Doors and the Humboldt Unified School District are major employers. Mining still anchors Bagdad, where Freeport-McMoRan runs an open-pit copper and molybdenum mine and owns most of the town’s housing, one of only two remaining company towns in Arizona. Tourism drives the economy around Sedona and Jerome, and the Verde Valley’s vineyards have built a wine-country identity around Cottonwood. Prescott’s biggest annual event is the World’s Oldest Rodeo, held every Fourth of July weekend since 1888.

History

The Arizona Territory’s first legislature created Yavapai County on November 9, 1864, one of the territory’s original four counties along with Mohave, Yuma and Pima. It was named for the Yavapai people, whose ancestral territory covers much of central Arizona. Prescott, founded that same year, served as the territorial capital from 1864 to 1867 and again from 1877 to 1889, before the capital moved permanently to Phoenix.

Gold discovered on Lynx Creek in 1863 drew the first wave of prospectors ahead of the county’s formation, and copper mining later built and then emptied whole towns: Jerome held more than 10,000 people in the 1920s before the United Verde mine closed in 1953, and Clarkdale was built in 1912 as a company smelter town for Jerome’s ore. On June 30, 2013, the Yarnell Hill Fire burned roughly half of Yarnell and killed 19 members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, the deadliest wildland firefighting loss in the United States since 1933; the Granite Mountain Hotshots Memorial State Park, dedicated in 2016, sits three miles south of town.

Getting There

Interstate 17 crosses the county’s eastern side through Camp Verde and Black Canyon City, and Interstate 40 crosses the north through Ash Fork and Seligman. No interstate reaches Prescott itself; access is via US Route 89, US Route 93 and State Routes 69, 89A, 169, 179 and 260.

• Phoenix — about 90 miles south
• Flagstaff — about 70 miles northeast
• Sedona — about 55 miles northeast of Prescott
• Kingman — about 90 miles west

Ernest A. Love Field (PRC), seven miles north of downtown Prescott, offers commercial service to Denver and Los Angeles alongside general aviation traffic. Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, about 100 miles south, is the nearest major hub. Amtrak has no station in Yavapai County; the closest stop is the Southwest Chief station in Flagstaff.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Yavapai County located?
It sits in Arizona’s central highlands, about 90 miles north of Phoenix, bordered by Mohave, La Paz, Maricopa, Gila and Coconino counties.

What is the population of Yavapai County?
236,209 at the 2020 census, with an estimate near 252,552 by 2024.

How big is Yavapai County?
8,123 square miles (21,040 km2) of land, plus about 4.4 square miles of water.

What is the county seat of Yavapai County?
Prescott, which also served twice as the Arizona Territory’s capital, in 1864–1867 and 1877–1889.

How many towns and cities are in Yavapai County?
Ten incorporated places — the cities of Prescott, Cottonwood and Sedona (partly), and the towns of Prescott Valley, Chino Valley, Camp Verde, Clarkdale, Dewey-Humboldt, Jerome and Wickenburg (partly) — plus more than a dozen census-designated places.

What ZIP codes does Yavapai County use?
86301 for Prescott, 86314 and 86315 for Prescott Valley, 86323 for Chino Valley, 86326 for Cottonwood and Verde Village, 86322 for Camp Verde, and smaller codes for Clarkdale, Dewey-Humboldt, Cornville, Mayer, Jerome and Ash Fork among others.

What is Yavapai County known for?
Prescott’s two stints as territorial capital, Jerome’s former copper-boom town clinging to Cleopatra Hill, and Sedona’s red-rock formations shared with neighboring Coconino County.

More counties in this state: Towns and villages in Arizona.