Port Orange is a principal city in the Deltona-Daytona Beach-Ormond Beach Metropolitan Statistical Area (which is also known as the "Fun Coast"). The Florida campus of Palmer College of Chiropractic is located in Port Orange.

Port Orange engaged with a major urban redeveloper to redevelop a blighted section south of downtown into "Port Orange Riverwalk." Many citizens were in favor, many against... but the timing of the project turned out to be horrible: with a price tag estimated at $750 million, 2006 was not an auspicious time to begin construction on a project that would take several years to complete. Florida's economy being what it is, the effects of the 2008 "Great Recession" hit Florida hard beginning in 2006... No sooner did the site get razed and construction begin when everything was shut down by the financial overseers of the project.

Since 2000, the populaton of Port Orange has grown more than 22%.