The Largest Churches in America
The 25 biggest US churches by weekly attendance, side by side with the number every other list leaves out: how many people they reach online.
Life.Church in Edmond, Oklahoma is the largest church in America, with about 85K people attending weekly across its campuses, according to the 2025 Outreach 100 list compiled with Lifeway Research. Church of the Highlands (60K) and Christ's Church of the Valley (54.1K) follow. Together, the 25 churches below draw more than 732K people every week. Attendance is only half the picture, though: 20 of these 25 churches also appear in the Church Influence 100, where the ranking flips once you measure online reach.
85K
Weekly attendance at #1
1,500+
US megachurches (Hartford Institute)
20 of 25
Also in the Influence 100
28.97M
Largest online reach on this list
The 25 Largest Churches in America (2026)
Weekly attendance as self-reported to the 2025 Outreach 100 (Lifeway Research). Online reach measured by the Church Influence 100. Click any linked church for its full profile.
| Rank | Church | Weekly Attendance |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Life.Church Edmond, OK | 85K |
| 2 | Church of the Highlands Birmingham, AL | 60K |
| 3 | Christ's Church of the Valley Peoria, AZ | 54.1K |
| 4 | Lakewood Church Houston, TX | 45K |
| 5 | North Point Ministries Alpharetta, GA | 37K |
| 6 | Crossroads Church Cincinnati, OH | 34K |
| 7 | Christ Fellowship Church Palm Beach Gardens, FL | 29.5K |
| 8 | Saddleback Church Lake Forest, CA | 28K |
| 9 | Southeast Christian Church Louisville, KY | 28K |
| 10 | Eagle Brook Church Twin Cities, MN | 26.7K |
| 11 | Fellowship Church Grapevine, TX | 24.2K |
| 12 | LCBC Church Manheim, PA | 23.2K |
| 13 | Dream City Church Phoenix, AZ | 22.5K |
| 14 | The Church of Eleven22 Jacksonville, FL | 21.6K |
| 15 | Lakepointe Church Rockwall, TX | 21.3K |
| 16 | Central Church Henderson, NV | 21.1K |
| 17 | Mariners Church Irvine, CA | 20.5K |
| 18 | Community Bible Church San Antonio, TX | 20.3K |
| 19 | Bayside Church Roseville, CA | 20K |
| 20 | Prestonwood Baptist Church 2024 figure Plano, TX | 19.6K |
| 21 | Second Baptist Church Houston, TX | 19.6K |
| 22 | Woodlands Church The Woodlands, TX | 18.4K |
| 23 | Gateway Church Southlake, TX | 18.1K |
| 24 | Elevation Church Charlotte, NC | 17.4K |
| 25 | Ministerio Internacional El Rey Jesus Miami, FL | 16.8K |
Attendance source: Outreach 100 / Lifeway Research (2025), self-reported by churches. Online reach: REACHRIGHT Church Influence 100, June 2026.
Why the Biggest Church Isn't the Most Influential
Attendance and influence used to be the same measurement. If you wanted to know which churches shaped American Christianity, you counted cars in parking lots. Not anymore.
Elevation Church ranks 24th on this list with 17.4K weekly attendees, a fraction of Life.Church's 85K. Measure online reach instead and Elevation is #1 in the country with 28.97M combined followers, roughly 1667x its own weekly attendance. One church fills buildings. The other fills feeds. Both matter, but only one of those numbers shows up on this kind of list.
That gap is exactly why we built the Church Influence 100 and its companion rankings: the most influential churches in America and the most influential pastors. Same churches, completely different order.
What Counts as a Megachurch?
A megachurch is a Protestant congregation that averages 2,000 or more people in weekly attendance, the definition used by the Hartford Institute for Religion Research. By that standard, the US has more than 1,500 megachurches. Every church on this page clears the bar by a factor of eight or more.
Most of the churches here are also multisite: one church meeting on many campuses, sometimes across several states. That is how Life.Church reaches 85K people a week without owning a single stadium-sized building, while Lakewood packs 45K into one former arena.
The takeaway
Every number in the attendance column is self-reported. Nobody audits it. The online reach column is different: anyone can open YouTube and check it. That is the direction church measurement is heading, and it is measurable for your church too. Get your church's Influence Score or see how the giants compare worldwide on the largest churches in the world.
Questions, Answered
What is the largest church in America?
Life.Church, based in Edmond, Oklahoma, is the largest church in America with about 85,000 people attending weekly across its campuses, according to the 2025 Outreach 100 list compiled with Lifeway Research. Church of the Highlands in Birmingham, Alabama (60,000) and Christ's Church of the Valley in Peoria, Arizona (54,142) rank second and third.
Is Lakewood Church the biggest church in America?
No. Lakewood Church in Houston, pastored by Joel Osteen, reports about 45,000 weekly attendees, which ranks fourth in the 2025 Outreach 100 data. Lakewood holds the largest single sanctuary, a converted arena seating about 16,000, but multisite churches like Life.Church (85,000 across dozens of campuses) now surpass it in total weekly attendance.
How many megachurches are in the United States?
The United States has more than 1,500 megachurches, according to the Hartford Institute for Religion Research, which defines a megachurch as a Protestant congregation averaging 2,000 or more people in weekly attendance. The 25 churches on this page represent the extreme top of that group, together drawing over 732K people every week.
Are the largest churches also the most influential?
Not reliably. Attendance measures who shows up in a building. Influence measures who a church actually reaches, and most of that now happens online. Elevation Church ranks 24th on this list by attendance (17,373) yet holds the #1 spot in the Church Influence 100 with 28.97M combined online followers. The two lists overlap, but they are measuring different things.
Where do these attendance numbers come from?
Attendance figures are self-reported by churches to Outreach Magazine's annual Outreach 100 project, compiled with Lifeway Research, using the 2025 list. No independent body audits church attendance, so treat every number as a church-reported estimate. Online reach figures come from the REACHRIGHT Church Influence 100, which measures public follower counts that anyone can verify.
Influence like this gets built on purpose.
Every church on this list posts consistently, in formats people actually watch. That's not luck. That's a system. We run that system for churches every week: sermon clips, graphics, carousels, captions, posted for you.