Map of Montana

History

For thousands of years, various indigenous peoples have inhabited the land that is now Montana. Historic tribes encountered by Europeans and settlers from the United States included the Crow in the south-central area, the Cheyenne and Lakota in the southeast, the Blackfeet, Assiniboine, and Gros Ventres in the central and north-central area, and the Kootenai and Salish the (Séliš or "Flathead") in the west. The (Ql̓ispé or Pend d'Oreilles) and Kalispel tribes lived near Flathead Lake and the western mountains, respectively. A part of southeastern Montana was used as a corridor between the Crows and the related Hidatsas in North Dakota.

Geography

Montana is one of the eight Mountain States, located in the north of the Western United States region. It borders North Dakota and South Dakota to the east. Wyoming is to the south, Idaho is to the west and southwest, and the Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and Saskatchewan are to the north, making it the only state to border three Canadian provinces.

With an area of 147,040 square miles (380,800 km2), Montana is slightly larger than Japan or Germany. It is the fourth-largest state in the United States after Alaska, Texas, and California, and is the largest landlocked state.

The state's topography is roughly defined by the Continental Divide, which splits much of the state into distinct eastern and western regions.

Economy

In 2025, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis estimated Montana's gross domestic product was $82.3 billion and the state's per capita personal income was $72,340.

Montana is a relative hub of beer microbrewing, ranking third in the nation in number of craft breweries per capita in 2024. Significant industries exist for lumber and mineral extraction; the state's resources include gold, coal, silver, talc, and vermiculite. Ecotaxes on resource extraction are numerous. A 1974 state severance tax on coal (which varied from 20 to 30%) was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in Commonwealth Edison Co. v. Montana, 453 U.S. 609 (1981).

Demographics

The United States Census Bureau states that the population of Montana was 1,132,812 on July 1, 2023, a 4.5% increase since the 2020 census. The 2020 census put Montana's population at 1,084,225. During the first decade of the new century, growth was mainly concentrated in Montana's seven largest counties, with the highest percentage growth in Gallatin County, which had a 32.9% increase in its population from 2010 to 2020. The city having the largest percentage growth was Kalispell, with 40.1%, and the city with the largest increase in actual residents was Billings, with an increase in population of 12,946 from 2010 to 2020.