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Demographics of Littleton, CO
Affluence Level in Littleton, CO
An upper-middle-class area. Household wealth, education levels, and homeownership run ahead of national benchmarks.
People of Littleton, CO
Littleton, Colorado, is a predominantly white, college-educated city of 45,092 residents, where 78.5% of the population identifies as non-Hispanic white and over half hold a bachelor's degree or higher. The city's character is shaped by its historic downtown, strong public schools, and a culture that blends Western heritage with modern suburban conservatism. With a foreign-born population of just 3.5% — well below the national average — Littleton remains one of the more ethnically homogeneous suburbs in the Denver metro area, though its Hispanic and East/Southeast Asian communities are slowly growing.
How the city was settled and grew
Littleton's original population was drawn by the 1858-59 Pike's Peak Gold Rush, but unlike mining boomtowns, the settlement grew as an agricultural service center. The town was platted in 1862 by Richard Sullivan Little, a railroad contractor, and incorporated in 1890. The first wave of settlers were Anglo-American farmers and merchants from the Midwest and Upper South, who built the Historic Downtown Littleton district along Main Street. By the early 1900s, a small but distinct community of German and Scandinavian immigrants had arrived, settling in the Littleton Village area near the South Platte River. The sugar beet industry, which boomed from 1900 to 1920, brought a wave of Mexican and Mexican-American laborers who established the Bowles Grove neighborhood — still a Hispanic-majority pocket today. The city remained a small, overwhelmingly white farming town of roughly 3,000 people through World War II.
Modern era (post-1965)
Littleton's modern demographic transformation began with the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, but the city's growth was driven far more by domestic in-migration than by foreign immigration. The 1970s and 1980s saw a massive influx of white-collar families from the Midwest and California, drawn by the expanding Denver tech and aerospace economy. These newcomers filled the new suburban subdivisions of Columbine Valley and Ken Caryl Ranch — master-planned communities that remain overwhelmingly white and affluent today. The 1990s brought a smaller but notable wave of East/Southeast Asian professionals — primarily Chinese and Korean engineers working at Lockheed Martin and other aerospace firms — who concentrated in the Southwest Littleton neighborhoods near C-470. The Hispanic population, which had been present since the beet-field era, grew modestly from 8% in 1990 to 12.6% today, with the Littleton Village and Bowles Grove areas remaining the primary Hispanic enclaves. The Indian-subcontinent population (0.6%) and Black population (1.6%) remain very small, with no single neighborhood reaching even 5% of either group. The city's white share has declined slowly — from 88% in 1990 to 78.5% today — but Littleton remains far less diverse than neighboring Denver or Aurora.
The future
Littleton's population is aging and slowly diversifying, but the pace of change is modest. The Hispanic share is projected to reach 15-17% by 2040, driven by natural increase and continued in-migration from other Colorado suburbs, while the East/Southeast Asian share may edge toward 3-4% as tech employment grows. The Indian-subcontinent and Black populations are expected to remain below 2% each, as these groups continue to concentrate in Aurora and Broomfield instead. The city is not tribalizing into distinct ethnic enclaves — rather, the small Hispanic and Asian populations are dispersing across the city, with only Bowles Grove retaining a concentrated Hispanic identity. The biggest demographic shift is generational: Littleton's median age has risen to 42, and the city is seeing an outflow of young families to more affordable exurbs like Castle Rock and Parker, while empty-nesters and retirees move into new downtown apartments. The white share will likely settle around 72-75% by 2040, making Littleton a slowly diversifying but still predominantly white, college-educated suburb.
For a conservative-leaning mover today, Littleton offers a stable, safe, and well-educated community where demographic change is gradual rather than disruptive. The city's character is set by its established white professional class, with Hispanic and Asian communities present but small and integrated. New arrivals will find a place that values its historic identity, invests in its schools, and remains one of the more culturally and politically moderate-to-conservative suburbs in the Denver metro area — a place where the population is changing, but not transforming.
* Values derived from national, state, county, city and local statistics and may differ in a specific area. Last updated: 2026-04-19T07:21:40.000Z
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