Florida population tops 23 million for first time. Where are people moving from?
Have you felt a little crowded lately?
Florida's population topped 23 million for the first time ths year, according to a report released Friday from the state Demographic Estimating Conference, mostly due to people moving here from other states. But that's starting to slow down.
As of April 1, there were 23,002,597 people living in the Sunshine State, the report said, solidifying our position as the third-most populated state behind California (39.5 million) and Texas (30.5 million). Last year's estimates were adjusted upward after there were fewer births and deaths than expected, the report said.
That's roughly a 15% increase since we hit 20 million for the first time in 2015.
However, deaths are still outpacing births in Florida and the rate of population increase is expected to keep slowing down, the report said.
How fast is Florida's population growing?
The state has been adding between 300,000 to 380,000 residents for the last 10 years, the report said, with 358,735 added in 2023, a 1.62% increase.
For the next five years, population growth in Florida is expected to slow down and average 319,019 new residents per year, net, or 874 per day. By the time another decade rolls around, Florida's population increase is projected to be just 0.85%.
"These increases are analogous to adding a city slightly smaller than Orlando, but larger than St. Petersburg every year," the report said.
Florida ranks among the lowest states by percentage for people moving to another state, although the Census did note that in 2022, 51,380 people crossed the border to live in Georgia and 41,747 Floridians moved to Texas.
The study was part of a long-range projection produced by the Bureau of Economic and Business Research.
Are most people moving to Florida?
In 2022 the Census Bureau declared that Florida was the fastest-growing state in the nation for the first time since 1957. That slowed down after the state's peak gain during the COVID years, however.
Florida added 365,205 new inhabitants in 2023, data shows, still the second-largest numeric growth behind Texas and the second-largest percentage of growth behind South Carolina.
This year the U.S. Census Bureau declared that four of the five fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the country, by percentage, were in Florida (The Villages was No. 1) and named Polk, Pasco and Marion counties as three of the fastest-growing counties in the nation. And one study showed that middle-class millennials were among the most eager to move here. Over half a million people moved here in 2022 just from New York.
Immigration also played a part.
"Just as net international migration bolstered the nation’s population gains, so is the case for most states.," Brookings Institution demographer William Frey said. "Some of the biggest gains occurred in the high-immigration states of Florida, California, and Texas, with New York only modestly declining from its already high levels."
In 2019, there were more than 4 million immigrants living in Florida, according to a 2020 Pew Research Center study. And immigrants tend to be younger, of child-bearing age or with young families.
“Nationally, immigration is kind of the key to growth in the younger populus,” Frey told The Hill.
Where are new Florida residents coming from?
According to the latest migration figures, of the 267,030 people who moved here from another state in 2022, these are where the most new residents came from:
New York: 91,201
California: 50,701
Georgia: 39,950
Texas: 38,207
Pennsylvania: 35,384
Illinois: 35,262
North Carolina: 24,601
Maryland: 23,422
Michigan: 23,781
Colorado: 20,980
However, the Census Bureau estimates that 489.904 people moved out of Florida the same year.
32,932 virginia
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Florida population tops 23 million, Still 3rd in US
