Amish Population

There are currently 589 known Amish settlements, with about 63% of them located in three states: Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana.

The estimated population for 2020 is

Pennsylvania has about 81,000

Ohio has about 78,000

Indiana has about 59,000

In addition, there are apparently thousands or even thousands of Amish people in each state.

If you look at their distribution, you can see that the Amish are found mainly on the East Coast, from Pennsylvania to Ohio.

It is often thought that the Amish are in decline because they do not use modern technology such as the internet or cars, but in fact this is not the case. On the contrary, their population is continuing to grow.

The number of church districts, which was approximately 200 in 1951, has increased to approximately 2,600 in 2020.

This is because the typical Amish family is fertile, averaging about five children.

It is also not uncommon for families to have 10 or more children.

When these children grow up, they experience life in the "outside world" outside the Amish community and then decide whether they want to live as Amish or not, and about 80% of them choose to live as Amish. Even after making that decision, they are free to leave the Amish community, but this is apparently a rare case.

The Amish do not solicit others to join the Amish community, but if you follow the Amish guidelines, you can join. Apparently, dozens of people who had never left the Amish community have done so.

Since there are many families and their children remain in the Amish community, connections between relatives are very wide, and it seems that many people in the same industry are related to one another.

Like Japan, there are now many areas in the United States where the birthrate is declining, but in the past it was fairly common for families to have four or five children in both Japan and the United States.

The landlord who looked after us locally also had about 10 children. He introduced us to them all, but I can't remember them all.

If we think of the Amish as maintaining a traditional American lifestyle, we might say that it is actually the modern era that has changed.

Source: “Amish Population, 2020.” Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, Elizabethtown College.