How Texas Triangle Cities are Growing

North Texas is king when it comes to growth.

Updated Census Bureau numbers released Wednesday include lots of good news for people betting on Dallas-Fort Worth’s continued rise.

First, Fort Worth cracked the top 10 list. Cowtown, after inching up to the 11th-largest American city last year, is now in the number 10 spot with a population of 1.03 million. After surpassing Austin in population in 2025, it remains the fourth-largest city in Texas, behind Houston (2.4 million), San Antonio (1.5 million) and Dallas (1.3 million).

Fort Worth added 19,512 residents between mid-2024 and mid-2025, the second-largest numerical increase among cities with populations of 20,000 people or more. Of the top 10 cities on this list, six were in Texas. The other five cities are:

San Antonio ranked third, adding 14,359 people;
Celina, a north Dallas suburb, ranked fourth, adding 12,710;
Houston ranked fifth, adding 11,515;
Fulshear, a Houston suburb, came in seventh, adding 11,196; and
McKinney, another north Dallas suburb ranked 10th, adding 8,504.

Among the five Texas Triangle metros, Austin ranked fourth in terms of numerical growth, adding 4,025 people. Dallas was the only city to lose population; its count fell by 1,808.

North Texas also dominated the list of cities with populations of 20,000 or more ranked by percentage increase in population. Celina, a town of 64,427 people about 40 miles north of Downtown Dallas, reclaimed the title of fastest-growing city in the country from neighbor Princeton. Between July 2024 and July 2025, the town grew by 24.6 percent.

Developers are hard at work building housing for all those people. The growth has translated to booming business for legendary landman Rex Glendenning, who is in the process of developing the 3,200-acre Legacy Hills, 600-acre King Place and 150-acre Shawnee Trail.

“For 34 years, I’ve been buying green bananas up here, and now they’ve ripened up a little bit,” Glendenning told the Dallas Business Journal in late 2024. His family has been living in Celina since the 1880s.

After Celina, Fulshear comes in second, with a 21 percent jump in population. Princeton, Melissa, Anna and Forney are ranked third, fourth, fifth and eighth, respectively.