The Amish in Pennsylvania: 2024 Guide (60+ Communities)
When most people think “Amish”, the first place that comes to mind is Lancaster County, PA. But the Amish presence in the Keystone State goes well beyond that community.
As of 2024, Pennsylvania has the nation’s largest Amish population – over 92,000 Amish people living in 63 settlements.
Amish communities in Pennsylvania
- Lancaster County – The Lancaster County community is the oldest, largest, and best-known of all Amish settlements
- Big Valley – This central PA settlement is home to three distinct Amish groups
- New Wilmington – This large community in western Pennsylvania is a quite conservative Amish affiliation
- Indiana County/Smicksburg – Over 3,000 Amish live in Indiana County in west-central PA
- Somerset County – The Somerset County group is small, but is the second-oldest Amish community in the world
- Other PA Amish communities – Dozens of Amish settlements are scattered across the state – some with just a handful of households, others home to thousands of Amish people
Lancaster County
Lancaster County is home to the oldest (founded circa 1760) and largest Amish community in the world, with an estimated population of 43,640 Amish people in 250+ congregations (as of 2024). The Lancaster County community includes many congregations located in neighboring counties, including Chester, Berks, and Cecil County, Maryland.
Lancaster County Amish drive distinct gray-topped buggies. If you see this color buggy in other parts of the country, you know that the community has origins in Lancaster County (or a Lancaster spin-off settlement).
Nearly all Lancaster church districts are considered to be of the same affiliation. Individual Amish churches each have their own rules. But all of the Amish in Lancaster County are of one group or affiliation, meaning they cooperate on church matters.
There is some variety of practice and technology among districts, with more conservative Amish generally living in the southern half of the settlement. However, Lancaster County Amish as a whole are considered to be among the most progressive when it comes to technology allowed.
Traditional family dairy farming remains important to Lancaster County Amish, though population pressures have limited agricultural opportunities. Some Amish have begun small-scale produce operations, suited to labor-intensive agriculture on small plots of land. Some Amish in this community also raise tobacco as a cash crop.
Business has been one important way Amish have made a living in the face of high land costs. Small business is very important in the Lancaster Amish economy, with thousands of Amish-owned companies in the region. These include manufacturers, builders, quilt makers, furniture shops, market stands, and a variety of others (read more on PA Amish furniture).
In response to land pressure, Lancaster County Amish have also formed numerous daughter settlements in states such as Wisconsin, Indiana, New York, and Maryland.
Lancaster County is by far the most heavily-visited Amish community, and it has developed a thriving tourist industry. Some Amish people participate in tourism, either operating businesses selling product to tourists, or in some cases catering directly to tour groups.
Some Amish see tourism and the crowds it brings as detrimental to the community. Others appreciate its positive side in the economic support it provides.
Lancaster County became known to the world after the tragic schoolhouse shootings of October 2006, in which five Amish girls died, and five were wounded, at the hands of a disturbed gunman. The Amish response of forgiveness became a headline story around the world, which inspired many.
Old Order Mennonites in Lancaster County
Lancaster County is also home to a large population of Old Order Mennonites, who populate the northern end of the county (near Ephrata and the surrounding areas). Old Order Mennonites are distinguished from the Amish here by their black-topped buggies and use of bicycles (local Amish primarily use push-scooters instead). So if you see a black buggy in Lancaster County, that’s not an Amish buggy.
Also know as “Team” Mennonites, this group has maintained a stronger connection to farming than the Amish, and rely more heavily on tractors as well to manage and work the land. Old Order Mennonites and Amish cooperate on education and operate joint schools, attended by children of both groups.
Old Order Mennonites also wear plain clothing (though of a different style) and speak Pennsylvania Dutch. There are several different groups of Old Order Mennonites in the county, some more progressive, and some even more traditional in ways than the Amish.
“Big Valley”
Pennsylvania is home to the well-known settlement at Kishacoquillas Valley, also known as “Big Valley” (Mifflin County). Big Valley is exactly that – a 30 mile-long by 5-mile wide valley, home to three distinct groups of Amish – called the Byler, Renno, and Nebraska groups.
These groups are most easily distinguished by the colors of their buggies – black for the Renno Amish, white for the Nebraska Amish, and yellow for the Byler Amish (the smallest and most progressive of the three groups).
The Nebraska Amish have traditionally been among the most conservative in Pennsylvania and in Amish society as a whole. However, some Nebraska Amish churches have been accepting greater levels of technology in recent years, including the use of old-style mobile phones (e.g., “flip” phones).
Big Valley is the third-oldest of all Amish settlements (founded around 1791) and is home to around 35 church districts (congregations) spread across its three main affiliations, and a total of 5,420 Amish people as of 2024. This makes it the ninth-largest Amish community in the nation.
Belleville in the center of the community is home to a well-known auction building, where each week the Amish and their neighbors gather to buy and sell livestock and other goods, enjoy meals, and chew the fat. The Big Valley Amish community remains largely off the tourist trail, due to its fairly remote location.
New Wilmington
The small college town of New Wilmington, north of Pittsburgh, is at the center of a quite conservative settlement of Amish. The New Wilmington group is the fourth-largest in the state, with approximately 3,000 Amish in 21 congregations as of 2024.
If you visit the New Wilmington settlement, you’ll likely notice two distinct colors – the unusual burnt-orange or brownish hue of the buggies, unique to this settlement.
The other color you’ll notice is blue – nearly all the doors on Amish homes here are painted a sky blue, and local Amish people mostly stick to wearing shades of blue and purple.
Amish homes here do not have bathrooms (outhouses are used) and kerosene fuel is use for lighting and other purposes (two signs of a more traditional Amish group).
The New Wilmington Amish have origins in the Big Valley settlement, specifically with Big Valley’s Byler group. Interestingly, in the early years of this settlement, members of the community apparently traveled between New Wilmington and their “home” settlement in Big Valley on foot – a distance of 250 miles, lasting 5 or 6 days.
“Byler” is by far the most common last name in the New Wilmington community. New Wilmington is the only surviving Pennsylvania community founded in the 19th century (1847).
Smicksburg (Indiana County)
Lying about an hour’s drive northeast of Pittsburgh, the area of Smicksburg (Indiana County) is home to PA’s third-largest Amish settlement (3,315 Amish in 25 churches as of 2024).
Founded in 1962, Amish in this community drive Midwestern-style black buggies. This group is neither the most progressive, nor most conservative, landing somewhere in “the middle” in terms of church rules and material standards.
Somerset County
Another distinct Pennsylvania Amish settlement can be found at Somerset County in the south-central part of the state.
Somerset County is unusual among Pennsylvania settlements – and in fact among nearly all Amish communities. Why is that? The Amish here are one of the only groups of Amish who hold Sunday service at meetinghouses. This is opposed to home worship, the standard practice by which Amish use workshops, basements, and even barn spaces to hold their Sunday gatherings.
Founded around 1772, Somerset County is home to the second-oldest Amish community in North America.
Despite its over 250-year history, this settlement remains very small compared to Lancaster County. The community is home to approximately 1,565 Amish in 11 congregations as of 2024.
Though they were founded at more or less the same time, the Somerset County community has grown at a much slower pace.
Other PA Amish settlements
Besides those covered above, Pennsylvania is home to dozens more Amish settlements. Let’s have a look at several of them.
Nearby Lancaster County “sister” settlements
The communities in Lebanon County (1,475 Amish, founded 1941) and Dauphin County (1,840 Amish, founded 1978) are two Lancaster County-origin settlements located in neighboring counties to Lancaster.
These two settlements are reachable within a relatively short drive from the home community (and, in the case of Lebanon County, even realistically reachable on a long buggy ride, depending where you’re going).
These two long-established communities are good examples of Lancaster County Amish settling in new areas. Amish people move and settle in new places for different reasons including a desire to find a less-crowded community, a desire to start a more progressive or conservative church, and seeking economic opportunity. In recent years, much out-migration from Lancaster County has been caused by the high price of land in the home settlement.
Centre County
Centre County in – you guessed it – central PA contains several extensive valleys, each with significant Amish settlements. They are:
- Aaronsburg/Penns Valley (350 Amish; founded 1950)
- Brush Valley (1,305 Amish; founded 1967)
- A second Penns Valley community (650 Amish; founded 1979)
- Nittany Valley (1,700 Amish; founded 1973)
Pennsylvania’s geography contains many long valleys and these aren’t the only ones with an Amish presence. The Centre County valleys generally maintain church ties with Amish youth from different valleys also visiting one another.
Juniata County
Also in central PA, the sizeable Juniata County Amish settlement (1,320 Amish) has roots in the Big Valley community, a spin-off Renno Amish community.
For that matter, the Sinking Valley settlement (440 Amish) in Blair County also consists of settlers from the Big Valley settlement, but from the yellow-topper (Byler Amish) group.
These two communities are examples of how Amish from the Big Valley community have formed daughter settlements within the state.
York County
York County, neighboring Lancaster County, is today home to two Amish communities. In the first case (Airville/Delta area), Amish families started settling across the Susquehanna River in York County in the mid-1970s. These families and the churches which formed there were originally considered part of the Lancaster County settlement.
However, in recent times this York County Amish presence has started to be considered its own settlement, being listed independently in Amish publications. This York County community has a population of 1,215 Amish.
The second York County settlement is at Glen Rock and was started in 2016 (245 people). The effort to start this community got media attention at the time as a different model of Amish settlement.
Rather than an informal process taken on the individual family level, the Glen Rock community represents a more formal, intentional planned effort at creating a new Amish settlement.
Crawford County
Crawford County is noteworthy for being the county with the greatest number of individual Amish communities of any county in the country. A total of seven distinct Amish communities can be found within its borders.
Significant Amish settlements in this county include the community at Atlantic (1,310 Amish), Spartansburg (2,695 Amish), and Linesville (420 Amish).
Neighboring Mercer County is not far behind, with a total of six full or partial Amish communities in the county.
In Clearfield County, the community at Troutville is one of the state’s largest, at 2,730 Amish in size.
Others
Dozens more Amish communities, many just one or two congregations in size, can be found throughout Pennsylvania. Check the list linked at bottom for a full listing of Amish communities in PA and the nation as a whole.
Pennsylvania: An Amish Heartland
Pennsylvania is home to a wide variety of Amish settlements, ranging from the very conservative to the more progressive. Lancaster County is clearly the state’s most prominent community and will continue to be so, despite having faced skyrocketing land prices and urban encroachment in the latter half of the 20th century.
Though there has been significant out-migration in recent years, Amish continue to form new settlements in Pennsylvania, with a number being founded in the past decade.
Pennsylvania and Ohio have long been considered the foremost states when it comes to the Amish. The two states have nearly the same amount of settlements and total Amish population. The Lancaster County settlement is nearly identical in size to the large Holmes County, Ohio Amish settlement.
Despite their similarities in size, in the popular imagination, Pennsylvania remains the state most readily associated with the Amish, and Lancaster County the best-known and most heavily-visited community.
For more, see:
- “Amish Population 2024” Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, Elizabethtown College https://groups.etown.edu/amishstudies/population-2024/
- “Amish Population in the United States by State, County, and Settlement, 2024” – Annual population figures compiled by Edsel Burdge, Jr., Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, Elizabethtown College, in cooperation with Joseph F. Donnermeyer, School of Environment and Natural Resources, The Ohio State University, and with assistance from Adam Hershberger of the Ohio Amish Library.
- The Amish in America: Settlements that Failed, 1840-1960, David Luthy
- The New American Almanac, Raber’s Bookstore (Baltic, Ohio), Ben J. Raber
- The Riddle of Amish Culture, Donald B. Kraybill
Photo credits: PA Amish boy-Alonso Javier Torres; Amish women old photo-Russ Glasson; Intercourse PA sign-Kim Davies; New Wilmington Amish buggies-WCN 24/7; Smicksburg buggy-KitAy
Deborah and James Hart
We are inquiring about repairs to a pole building on our farm and also inquiring about replacing siding on a building owned by friends of ours in the Greensburg- Latrobe, Pa. area