Sullivan County
Tennessee · County seat: Blountville · Active county or equivalent
FIPS code 47163 is Sullivan County, Tennessee. With a population of 158,722 (2022 ACS estimate), it ranks #9 in Tennessee and #420 nationally. Sullivan County is part of the Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA. The state FIPS code for Tennessee is 47. This code is used in Census Bureau, BLS, EPA, HUD, and USDA federal datasets to identify this county.
County FIPS
47163
Population
158,722
2022 ACS · #420 nationally
Density
384.0/mi²
people per sq mile
Land Area
413
sq miles
Urban/Rural
Metro — 250K–1M population
RUCC 2
How This FIPS Code Works
The 5-digit FIPS code 47163 is formed by combining the 2-digit state identifier 47 (Tennessee) with the 3-digit county identifier 163. Together they uniquely identify Sullivan County in every US federal dataset. No two counties share the same 5-digit FIPS code.
Census ACS Data for FIPS 47163
From the 2022 ACS 5-year estimates — the same values you'd retrieve by querying the Census API with county FIPS 47163.
Median Household Income
$54,357
ACS B19013_001E
Poverty Rate
15.2%
ACS B17001 (below poverty level)
Median Age
45.2
ACS B01002_001E
Metropolitan Area
Adjacent Counties (7)
Counties that share a border with Sullivan County. Useful for regional analysis — these are the geographies you'd typically include when studying labor markets, commuting zones, or environmental spillovers around FIPS 47163.
Federal Datasets Using Code 47163
FIPS code 47163 appears as the county identifier in the following federal datasets. Analysts joining data across these sources use this code as the common geographic key.
Using FIPS Code 47163 in Code
Common patterns for querying federal datasets by this county's FIPS code. The leading zeros are significant — always treat FIPS codes as strings, not integers.
import requests
url = "https://api.census.gov/data/2022/acs/acs5"
params = {
"get": "NAME,B19013_001E,B01003_001E",
"for": "county:163",
"in": "state:47",
"key": "YOUR_CENSUS_API_KEY",
}
r = requests.get(url, params=params)
data = r.json() # [[header...], [Sullivan County, Tennessee, income, pop, ...]-- 5-digit combined FIPS (state + county)
SELECT * FROM your_table WHERE county_fips = '47163';
-- Some datasets store state and county separately
SELECT * FROM your_table
WHERE state_fips = '47'
AND county_fips = '163';
-- ⚠ Never cast to integer — leading zeros are lost:
-- county_fips = 47163 is WRONG for this countylibrary(tidycensus)
get_acs(
geography = "county",
variables = c(income = "B19013_001E", pop = "B01003_001E"),
state = "47",
county = "163",
year = 2022
)ZIP Codes in Sullivan County
ZIP codes do not align perfectly with county boundaries — a single ZIP code can span multiple counties, and a county can contain parts of many ZIP codes. The ratios below (from the Census 2020 ZCTA relationship file) show the land area share of each ZCTA that falls within Sullivan County. Why FIPS ≠ ZIP →
| ZIP Code | % in county |
|---|---|
| 37617 | 100.0% |
| 37618 | 100.0% |
| 37620 | 100.0% |
| 37665 | 100.0% |
| 37664 | 100.0% |
| 37686 | 99.7% |
| 37663 | 95.1% |
| 37660 | 90.9% |
| 37694 | 17.9% |
| 37656 | 8.3% |
| 37659 | 0.7% |
| 37857 | 0.6% |