There are 88 counties in the U.S. state of

Ohio Ohio () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Of the List of states and territories of the United States, fifty U.S. states, it is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 34th-l ...

. Nine of them existed at the time of the Ohio Constitutional Convention in 1802.. Other editions available at an
Google Books
/ref> A tenth county, Wayne, was established on August 15, 1796, and encompassed roughly the present state of

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and t ...

. Other editions available at During the Convention, the county was opposed to statehood, and was not only left out of the Convention, but dissolved; the current Wayne County is in northeastern Ohio, considerably distant from the area that was the original Wayne County. The

Ohio Constitution The Constitution of the State of Ohio is the basic governing document of the State of Ohio, which in 1803 became the 17th state to join the United States of America. Ohio has had three constitutions since statehood was granted. Ohio was crea ...

allows counties to set up a

charter A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the re ...

government as many cities and

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred ...

s do, (OH county charter). Other editions available: an
Google Books
/ref> but only

Summit A summit is a point on a surface that is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. The topographic terms acme, apex, peak (mountain peak), and zenith are synonymous. The term (mountain top) is generally used only for a m ...

and Cuyahoga counties have done so, the latter having been approved by voters in November 2009. Counties do not possess

home rule Home rule is government of a colony, dependent country, or region by its own citizens. It is thus the power of a part (administrative division) of a state or an external dependent country to exercise such of the state's powers of governance wi ...

powers and can do only what has been expressly authorized by the

Ohio General Assembly The Ohio General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Ohio. It consists of the 99-member Ohio House of Representatives and the 33-member Ohio Senate. Both houses of the General Assembly meet at the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus ...

. The elected county officials in

Ohio county government Ohio county government is the structure of official managerial and legal bodies of the counties of Ohio, USA. It is marked by a loose organization and a diffusion of power, the basic framework not having been changed since the nineteenth cent ...

s include three commissioners, a

sheriff A sheriff is a government official, with varying duties, existing in some countries with historical ties to England where the office originated. There is an analogous, although independently developed, office in Iceland that is commonly transla ...

(the highest law enforcement officer in the county); prosecutor (equivalent of a

district attorney In the United States, a district attorney (DA), county attorney, state's attorney, prosecuting attorney, commonwealth's attorney, or state attorney is the chief prosecutor and/or chief law enforcement officer representing a U.S. state in a ...

in other states);

coroner A coroner is a government or judicial official who is empowered to conduct or order an inquest into the manner or cause of death, and to investigate or confirm the identity of an unknown person who has been found dead within the coroner's jur ...

, engineer, auditor,

treasurer A treasurer is the person responsible for running the treasury of an organization. The significant core functions of a corporate treasurer include cash and liquidity management, risk management, and corporate finance. Government The treasury ...

, and

clerk of courts A court clerk (British English: clerk to the court or clerk of the court ; American English: clerk of the court or clerk of court ) is an officer of the court whose responsibilities include maintaining records of a court, administer oaths to witn ...

. Population figures are based on the 2021 vintage

Census A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses inc ...

population estimates. The population of Ohio was 11,780,017 at that time, a decrease of 0.2% from 2020. The average population of Ohio's counties was 133,864; Franklin County was the most populous (1,321,414) and Vinton County was the least (12,696). The average land area is . The largest county by area is

Ashtabula County Ashtabula County ( ) is the northeasternmost county in the U.S. state of Ohio. As of the 2020 census, the population was 97,574. The county seat is Jefferson. The county was created in 1808 and later organized in 1811. The name Ashtabula der ...

at , and its neighbor, Lake County, is the smallest at . The total area of the state is . The

Federal Information Processing Standard The Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) of the United States are a set of publicly announced standards that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has developed for use in computer systems of non-military, American ...

(FIPS) is used by the U.S. government to uniquely identify counties, and is provided for each entry. These codes link to the United States Census Bureau's "quick facts" for each county. Ohio's FIPS code of 39 is used to distinguish from counties in other states. For example, Adams County's unique nationwide identifier is 39001. However, the Bureau of Motor Vehicles and Department of Transportation instead identify counties by consecutive numbers and three-letter abbreviations, respectively. For historic preservation purposes, Ohio History Connection refers to counties by two- and three-letter abbreviations in the Ohio Archaeological Inventory and Ohio Historic Inventory, respectively.

List of counties

See also

References

Further reading