The 100-Mile Map of Texas: Austin Captures 21.3%, Misses the Rest

By SimpleMapLab·Published 13 May 2026·Rank #45 of 50 states·↑ All 50 states

Only 21.3% of Texas’s population lives within 100 miles of Austin. The state’s largest population centre — Houston — sits 156 miles from the capital, far outside the 100-mile circle. Texas ranks #45 of 50 states for capital centrality, meaning 5 states have a less-misplaced capital.

A 100-mile geodesic radius around the Austin, TX state capitol overlaid on Texas. 21.3% of Texas's population lives inside the dashed ring.

21.3%

of Texas’s population within 100 miles of Austin

6.45 M

residents inside the radius (of 30.26 M statewide)

52 mi

from Austin to Texas’s population centroid

#45

of 50 states ranked by capital-to-population centrality

Open this radius in the map → /tools/map-radius-tool · Austin, TX · 100 mi
The link opens the SimpleMapLab Map Radius Tool with the 100-mile circle already drawn around the Austin capitol. Change the radius to 50, 250, or any value to compare different framings.

Why this happened

Austin was selected as Texas' capital in 1839 by a deliberate vote of the Republic of Texas Congress, against the wishes of then-largest-city Houston. Sam Houston himself opposed the choice and tried to move the capital back to his namesake city when he became president of the Republic. The capital stayed in Austin and grew with it; today Austin metro is a thriving 2.4 million-person city in its own right, but it still reaches only 21.3% of Texas' population. Houston — sitting 156 miles east — holds nearly three times Austin's population.

Texas is unusual in that the capital is a fast-growing major metro — Austin is the 11th-largest US city. The 100-mile capital reach is low not because Austin is small, but because Texas is enormous. The state's true population centre sits somewhere between Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, and Austin — a triangle that fills almost the entire eastern half of the state.

The biggest cities inside the 100-mile radius

The top 5 most-populous places (by aggregated ZIP code population) sitting inside the 100-mile circle around Austin. Cities are listed by total population captured by ZIP centroids in the dataset.

#	City	Population in radius
1	San Antonio	1,877,669
2	Austin	1,166,827
3	Round Rock	184,922
4	Killeen	163,398
5	New Braunfels	144,962

The largest city outside the radius

Texas’s most-populous city outside the 100-mile circle is Houston, sitting 156 miles from Austin. The aggregated population of Houston’s ZIP codes alone — 3,237,593 residents — illustrates the gap between Texas’s political seat and its population centre.

How Texas compares

The states ranked closest to Texas on this metric. Click any to compare the radius breakdown directly.

#44 Nevada

Carson City · 21.8% pop. captured

#46 Illinois

Springfield · 19.1% pop. captured

#43 Wyoming

Cheyenne · 27.9% pop. captured

#47 New York

Albany · 14.7% pop. captured

#42 California

Sacramento · 31.0% pop. captured

Draw it yourself

Open the 100-mile circle around Austin →

The Map Radius Tool lets you change the radius (try 50 mi for an urban-suburban question or 250 mi for “a day’s drive”), drag the centre to compare Austin’s reach with that of San Antonio, or add a second circle for a side-by-side comparison.

Methodology (brief)

We took the lat/lng of the Texas state capitol building (30.2672°, -97.7431°) and drew a 100-mile geodesic radius. For every ZIP code in Texas, we tested whether the ZIP centroid falls inside; if so, its population counts. We then divide by Texas’s total population to produce the percentage. The full methodology for all 50 states is on the hub page.

Suggested citation: SimpleMapLab (2026). 100 Miles Around Austin: How Much of Texas Is Inside? Part of the State Capital Radius study. Retrieved from https://www.simplemaplab.com/studies/state-capital-radius/texas. Licensed under CC-BY 4.0.