THE COLES COUNTY LAND BRIEF
Land in the
Illinois/Indiana Prairies setting.
Coles County has 508.3 square miles of land in Illinois. 2 mapped landscape regions meet across Coles County: Illinois/Indiana Prairies, Southern Illinoian Till Plain.
Glaciated plains historically supported tallgrass prairie mixed with oak and hickory woodland. Dark prairie soils and broad farming landscapes distinguish much of the Central Corn Belt.
Regional context: Central Corn Belt Plains ↗ · Regional mapping across the county footprint
Where the landscape changes
Coles County intersects 2 mapped regional units. The largest mapped shares are:
- Illinois/Indiana Prairies98.7%
- Southern Illinoian Till Plain1.3%
Interior River Valleys and Hills in Coles County
Broad terraced river valleys contrast with wooded slopes and dissected glacial plains. Bottomland settings and upland oak landscapes occur close together across the Interior River Valleys and Hills.
Read the regional source ↗Finding your parcel within Coles County
The atlas lists 20 cities, towns, townships, and Census communities associated with Coles County, including Hutton, North Okaw, Ashmore. The list includes overlapping geography types and does not divide the county into exclusive service areas.
Coles County by land and water
The Census records 1.8 square miles of water within Coles County, or 0.4% of its total area. That share is close to Coles County’s 0.4%. This is geographic context; waterfront status and usable land must be checked at the parcel.
For scale, Coles County has 13.7 times the land area of nearby Charleston township (37.2 square miles). These areas describe boundaries, not comparable property prices.
The Census boundary meets Clark County, Cumberland County, Douglas County, Edgar County, Moultrie County, Shelby County within Illinois. A tract near one of these lines should be matched to the county identifier on its own records.

