The new 1st district contains the counties of Boone, Braxton, Cabell, Calhoun, Clay, Fayette, Gilmer, Greenbrier, Jackson, Kanawha, Lincoln, Logan, Mason, McDowell, Mercer, Mingo, Monroe, Nicholas, Pendleton, Pocahontas, Putnam, Raleigh, Roane, Summers, Wayne, Webster, Wirt, and Wyoming.

The cities are ancestrally Democratic strongholds, while the rural areas were much more conservative and had a tendency to swing Republican more often.

The original 1863 districting included also Tyler, Pleasants, Doddridge, Harrison, Ritchie, Wood, Wirt, Gilmer, Calhoun and Lewis counties.

[6] In 1962, Braxton, Calhoun, Doddridge, Gilmer, Harrison, Lewis, Marion and Taylor joined the five core counties.

[6] For 1992 the district consisted of Barbour, Brooke, Doddridge, Grant, Hancock, Harrison, Marion, Marshall, Mineral, Monongalia, Ohio, Pleasants, Preston, Ritchie, Taylor, Tucker, Tyler, Wetzel and Wood counties.

[6] For the 2020 census, the legislature abandoned the practice of numbering the districts from north to south and the first district was now the more southerly one, consisting of Boone, Braxton, Cabell, Calhoun, Clay, Fayette, Gilmer, Greenbrier, Jackson, Kanawha, Lincoln, Logan, Mason, McDowell, Mercer, Mingo, Monroe, Nicholas, Pendleton, Pocahontas, Putnam, Raleigh, Roane, Summers, Wayne, Webster, Wirt, and Wyoming counties.