The area of Vas County is 3336km2, a mere 3.58% of the entire country, which makes it the third smallest one in Hungary. Our population is 268,653 according to the figures of the last population census conducted in 2001. This constitutes 2.63% of Hungary’s population, and 26.82% of the population in West-Transdanubia.

Settlement structure
One of the main characteristic features of Vas County is its small villages. 127, that is 59%, of a total of 216 communities have fewer than 500 inhabitants, which is 6.9% of the national, and 33.3% of the regional average.. A high number of settlements per 100 km2 is a distinct sign of a high population density and the rather fragmented settlement structure.

As far as the degree of urbanisation is concerned, one can say that 56.2% of the population lives in urban areas, which is 7 percentage points lower than the national average. The most striking differences can be witnessed on the level of micro-regions: the two extremes are Szombathely with 72.1% on one end of the spectrum, while Őriszentpéter (in the Őrség region, the most western corner of the county), with 0% is on the other end since there are virtually no towns there.

There are nine settlements with a town rank, however none have more than 100.000 inhabitants. Only Szombathely has more than 50.000 (in year 2000 the census counted 81.228 people). The population in four more towns exceeds 10.000 (these are Sárvár, Körmend, Celldömölk and Kőszeg). Szentgotthárd is only slightly below this figure (9001 people registered in year 2000). In the towns of Vasvár, Csepreg and Répcelak, there are fewer than 5000 inhabitants.

Vas County presently has nine statistical micro-regions, with a difference in the absolute number of settlements. Szombathely has the largest number (40), while Szentgotthárd and Kőszeg the smallest (15). Relatively speaking, there are no such sharp differences among micro-regions. Sárvár’s settlement density is lower, while Csepreg’s density is strikingly higher than the average.

Demography
Number of inhabitants, population density
The number of inhabitants in the county decreased between 1999-2000 by 9500 people, that equals the number of inhabitants in the town of Szentgotthárd. In 2001 there were a total of 268,653 people.

The regional distribution of the population shows imbalances, which is a result of the unique settlement structure. On the one hand, there is a low population density in the micro-regions in the South, the South-East and the South-West. On the other hand, the agglomeration of Szombathely and the settlements around Kőszeg with an increasing degree of urbanisation show a high density.

Natural migration
The population has constantly been decreasing in the county for the last two decades. The peak of the decrease was registered in the second half of the past decade. The value of natural decrease was -0.0053 in 2000, which was significantly below the national average of -0.0038. The strong decline in the number of the population in the second half of the 1990s was due to a plunge in the number of live births, rather than the increase in the number of deaths. However, there are also signs of positive changes if we, for instance, consider the latest data on live births and deaths in the first three months of 2001. These figures look more encouraging than the data from a year earlier, thus one can say that that the county’s natural decrease has, perhaps, come to a halt.

These grim population indexes are typical of the whole of the county, however, the degree of natural decrease is by no means homogeneous, as there are differences among individual regions.