How many people lived in the American colonies in 1776?

How many people lived in the American colonies in 1776? About 2.5 million people lived in the Thirteen Colonies.

That figure is an estimate for the colonies that declared independence from Britain in 1776, not a headcount from a national census. The United States did not conduct its first federal census until 1790, fourteen years after independence, when the population was recorded as 3,929,214.

The colonial population had grown rapidly during the eighteenth century through immigration and natural increase. Most residents lived in rural farming communities, although port cities such as Philadelphia, New York, Boston, and Charleston were important centers of trade, politics, and manufacturing.

The 2.5 million estimate generally includes free and enslaved people in the thirteen colonies. It should not be confused with the population of all British North America, which also included territories outside the thirteen rebelling colonies. Nor does it describe the entire population of North America: Indigenous nations lived across the continent, and their populations were counted separately, inconsistently, or not at all by colonial authorities.