Texas County Map with Cities

Cities and counties are separate layers of government in Texas, and the relationship is not always obvious. A city sits inside a county, but a large city can spill across several: Houston extends into Fort Bend and Montgomery counties as well as Harris; Dallas reaches into Collin, Denton, Kaufman and Rockwall; and Austin crosses into Williamson and Hays counties. Your county determines where you vote, register a vehicle, serve on a jury and pay property taxes, so it matters even if you live inside a city.

Every Texas county has one county seat, where the courthouse and main county offices are located. In most counties the seat is also the largest town, but not always. In some fast-growing suburban counties, newer cities have outgrown the historic seat — for example, in Collin County the seat is McKinney, while Plano and Frisco are also major cities, and in Williamson County the seat is Georgetown even though Round Rock is larger. On our map, labels show the county seat, which is the most useful reference point for official business.

43 Texas counties have a seat with the same name as the county, including Andrews, Bandera, Bastrop, Burnet, Childress, Coleman. Browse every seat on our Texas county seats list.

• Find a city's county: search the city name in the box above, or open the interactive map and click the area.
• Plan a route through counties: trucking, field service and sales teams use county boundaries to divide territories; the map shows which seats lie along major corridors such as I-35, I-10 and I-20.
• Genealogy: records are kept at the county seat. If an ancestor lived near a county line, check both seats, and remember that the county may have been created later than the date you are researching.
• Teaching: students can match seats to counties, or use the blank county map as a quiz.
• Printing: our Texas map with counties and cities PDF shows all 254 counties labeled with seats on letter-size paper.

When a city crosses a county line, residents on each side vote in different county elections, pay different county tax rates and may use different courthouses — even with the same city address. If you are buying property or registering to vote, check the county shown on your appraisal district record rather than relying on your mailing address, which follows postal routes rather than county boundaries.

How many cities are in Texas? Texas has more than 1,200 incorporated cities, towns and villages, plus many unincorporated communities. Only the county seats are labeled on the statewide map to keep it readable.

What is the largest city by area? Houston covers more than 600 square miles of land, which is larger than many Texas counties.

Can a county have no cities? Yes. A few very sparsely populated counties have no incorporated municipality at all; the county seat is an unincorporated community.