The most information I can find on this is that there is no definite
number. The U.S. government does not collect such data, and as such it
is difficult to determine the number of adherents to any religion. The
best information I could find was located at www.prb.org and
www.islam101.com. One site listed as a reference the American Relgion
Data Archive (ARDA), but I could not find any count of Muslims on
their website. Any help on this would be much appreciated.

---

Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 05 Nov 2004 04:31 PST

politicalchick-ga,

ARDA does indeed have a figure for the number of Muslims estimated to
live in the US, and puts the number at 1,559,294 in 2000.

As the comment below notes, however, estimates appear to vary quite widely.  

What additional information do you need as an answer to your question?

pafalafa-ga

---

Clarification of Question by politicalchick-ga on 05 Nov 2004 10:39 PST

Well I was hoping that there was some answer other than "it is
difficult to estimate." So I suppose that requesting help and finding
that others have come to the same conclusion answers my question.
Thank you.

Hello again, politicalchick-ga,


Here are links to sources of information that are probably as close as
you can come to an "official" estimate of the Muslim population in the
US:


==========

http://www.thearda.com/
The American Religion Data Archive

Muslims (2000 data)

Congregations:  1209 

Number of adherents:  1,559,294 

Top 5 states:

1 California ........259,762 
2 New York.......... 223,968 
3 Illinois ..........125,203 
4 New Jersey ........120,724 
5 Texas .............114,999 


To see this data for yourself, head to the ARDA site and click on the
text that says:

Interactive Maps and Reports

On the resulting page, select the button for the "United States" under
the category "Membership Reports" to see the data for the entire US. 
The figures for the Muslim population are listed rather far down on
the page, under the  "Participants in 2000 only" heading.


Clicking on "US Map" under the "Maps" heading will take you to a
national map, and will also list the populations for individual
states.


==========

The City University of NY "American Religious Identification Survey"
can be found at:


http://www.gc.cuny.edu/studies/key_findings.htm


and presents two detailed tables in Exhibit I -- the first of
Christian denominations, and the second for everyone else.  In the
second part, the population of Muslims in the US in 2001 is given as:

1,104,000


==========

Lastly, the FACT -- Faith Communities Today -- study from the Hartford
Institute for Religion Research, has this to say about the Muslim
population:


http://fact.hartsem.edu/denom/denom-frame.htm
[click on "Muslim" in the left-hand frame]


The Muslim Faith Group

There are approximately 6 million Muslims in the U.S. with over 2
million of these being regularly participating adult attenders at the
more than 1,209 mosques/masjids in the United States.


==========

Notice that the last figures distinguish between the number of adult
Muslims that regularly attend services, as opposed to the total number
of people who consider themselves Muslims.  The distinction may well
account for much of the difference between figures cited in various
sources for the number of Muslims in the US.


I trust this fully answers your question.

But before rating this answer, please let me know if you would like
any additional information.


pafalafa-ga



search strategy:  Used bookmarked sites on Religion to compile the data.

As you can see from these Google search results, the estimates vary widely:

://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=estimated+%22million+muslims+in+the+united+states

Numbers are difficult for most religions and Muslims are more
difficult than most. We can get estimates on how many attend ten+
meetings per year, or a biger number who attend ten+ meetings per
decade, but some attend, but don't regularly consider themselves
Muslims. Some types of meetings are boarderline, in some peoples
opinion. Some Muslims rarely attend a meeting, but there are other
reasons to consider them Muslims. Considering a significant number of
Muslims in the USA illegally, it is hard to say if they "live" here or
not.   Neil

PC --

Here are some numbers for the state of Washington.  It might be a way
to roll up estimates for all 50 states:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=345315

Best regards,

Omnivorous-GA

The Number of Muslims in the Unisted States is about 5-6 million