In 2023 Moscow was the largest city in Europe with an estimated urban agglomeration of 12.68 million people. The French capital, Paris was the second largest city in 2023 at 11.2 million, followed by the capitals of the United Kingdom and Spain, with London at 9.6 million and Madrid at 6.75 million people. Istanbul, which would otherwise be the largest city in Europe in 2023, is excluded as it is only partially in Europe, with a sizeable part of its population living in Asia. Europe’s population almost 750 million Since 1950, the population of Europe has increased by approximately 200 million people, increasing from 550 million to 750 million in this seventy-year period. Prior to the turn of the millennium, Europe was the second-most populated continent, before it was overtaken by Africa, which saw its population increase from 228 million in 1950, to 817 million by 2000. Asia has consistently had the largest population of the world’s continents and was estimated to have a population of 4.6 billion. Europe’s largest countries Including its territory in Asia, Russia is by far the largest country in the world, with a territory of around 17 million square kilometers, almost double that of the next largest country, Canada. Within Europe, Russia also has the continents largest population at 145 million, followed by Germany at 83 million and the United Kingdom at almost 68 million. By contrast, Europe is also home to various micro-states such as San Marino, which has a population of just 30 thousand.

Rome is the most populous city in Italy. With 2.75 million inhabitants, the capital of the country put ahead Milan and Naples. Compared to the number of citizens in 2012, the resident population of Rome increased by over 140,000 individuals. Regional data Rome is located in the center of Italy in the Lazio region. Lazio is the second-largest region in terms of population size after Lombardy. In 2024, the region counts roughly 5.7 million inhabitants, whereas Lombardy has over ten million individuals. The third-largest region is Campania, with 5.6 million people. Naples, the major center of Campania, has around 910,000 inhabitants at the beginning of 2024. Nevertheless, this city was, back in the 19th century, one of the largest cities in Western Europe. Tourism in Rome The Eternal City is also the main tourist destination in Italy and was the eighth most-visited city in Europe. The largest groups of international visitors in Rome came from the United States of America, Japan, and the United Kingdom. Every year, more and more tourists also enjoy the best-known tourist attractions in Rome, like the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, and the Palatine Hill, which together recorded almost ten million visitors in 2022.

Lagos, in Nigeria, ranked as the most populated city in Africa as of 2024, with an estimated population of roughly nine million inhabitants living in the city proper. Kinshasa, in Congo, and Cairo, in Egypt, followed with some 7.8 million and 7.7 million dwellers. Among the 15 largest cities in the continent, another two, Kano, and Ibadan, were located in Nigeria, the most populated country in Africa. Population density trends in Africa As of 2022, Africa exhibited a population density of 48.3 individuals per square kilometer. At the beginning of 2000, the population density across the continent has experienced a consistent annual increment. Projections indicated that the average population residing within each square kilometer would rise to approximately 54 by the year 2027. Moreover, Mauritius stood out as the African nation with the most elevated population density, exceeding 640 individuals per square kilometre. Mauritius possesses one of the most compact territories on the continent, a factor that significantly influences its high population density. Urbanization dynamics in Africa The urbanization rate in Africa was anticipated to reach close to 44 percent in 2021. Urbanization across the continent has consistently risen since 2000, with urban areas accommodating 35 percent of the total population. This trajectory is projected to continue its ascent in the years ahead. Nevertheless, the distribution between rural and urban populations shows remarkable diversity throughout the continent. In 2021, Gabon and Libya stood out as Africa’s most urbanized nations, each surpassing 80 percent urbanization. In 2023, Africa's population was estimated to expand by 2.35 percent compared to the preceding year. Since 2000, the population growth rate across the continent has consistently exceeded 2.45 percent, reaching its pinnacle at 2.59 percent between 2012 and 2013. Although the growth rate has experienced a deceleration, Africa's population will persistently grow significantly in the forthcoming years.

In 2024, approximately 22.81 million people lived in the São Paulo metropolitan area, making it the biggest in Latin America and the Caribbean and the fifth most populated in the world. The homonymous state of São Paulo was also the most populous federal entity in the country. The second place for the region was Mexico City with 22.51 million inhabitants.

Brazil's cities

Brazil is home to two large metropolises, only counting the population within the city limits, São Paulo had approximately 12.4 million inhabitants, and Rio de Janeiro around 6.8 million inhabitants. It also contains a number of smaller, but well known cities such as Brasília, Salvador, Belo Horizonte and many others, which report between 2 and 3 million inhabitants each. As a result, the country's population is primarily urban, with nearly 85 percent of inhabitants living in cities.

Mexico City

Mexico City's metropolitan area ranks fifth in the ranking of most populated cities in the world. Founded over the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan in 1521 after the Spanish conquest as the capital of the Viceroyalty of New Spain, the city still stands as one of the most important in Latin America. Nevertheless, the preeminent economic, political, and cultural position of Mexico City has not prevented the metropolis from suffering the problems affecting the rest of the country, namely, inequality and violence. Only in 2021, the city registered a crime incidence of 45,336 reported cases for every 100,000 inhabitants and around 32 percent of the population lived under the poverty line.

In 2022, approximately 11.45 million people lived in São Paulo, making it the largest municipality in Brazil and one of the most populous cities in the world. The homonymous state of São Paulo was also the most populous federal entity in the country.

Brazil's cities

Brazil is home to two large metropolises: São Paulo with close to 11.45 million inhabitants, and Rio de Janeiro with around 6.21 million inhabitants. It also contains a number of smaller, but well known cities such as Brasília, Salvador, Belo Horizonte and many others, which report between 2 and 3 million inhabitants each. As a result, the country's population is primarily urban, with nearly 85 percent of inhabitants living in cities.

While smaller than some of the other cities, Brasília was chosen to be the capital because of its relatively central location. The city is also well-known for its modernist architecture and utopian city plan which is quite controversial - criticized by many and praised by others.

Sports venues capitals

A number of Brazil’s medium-sized and large cities were chosen as venues for the 2014 World Cup, and the 2015 Summer Olympics also took place in Rio de Janeiro. Both of these events required large sums of money to support infrastructure and enhance mobility within a number of different cities across the country. Billions of dollars were spent on the 2014 World Cup, which went primarily to stadium construction and renovation, but also to a number of different mobility projects. Other short-term spending on infrastructure for the World Cup and the Rio Olympic Games was estimated at around 50 billion U.S. dollars. While these events have poured a lot of money into urban infrastructure, a number of social and economic problems within the country remain unsolved.

By 1800, London had grown to be the largest city in Western Europe with just under one million inhabitants. Paris was now the second largest city, with over half a million people, and Naples was the third largest city with 450 thousand people. The only other cities with over two hundred thousand inhabitants at this time were Vienna, Amsterdam and Dublin. Another noticeable development is the inclusion of many more northern cities from a wider variety of countries. The dominance of cities from France and Mediterranean countries was no longer the case, and the dispersal of European populations in 1800 was much closer to how it is today, more than two centuries later.

The statistic depicts the ten largest cities in Mexico in 2020. In 2020, Mexico City had around 8.84 million residents which made it the largest city in Mexico.

Population of Mexico

Mexico is a federal republic located in North America, sharing borders with the United States to the north, and to the southeast with Guatemala and Belize. With a total area of over 1.9 million square kilometers, it is the fourteenth largest nation in the world and the fifth largest in the Americas.

In 2014, Mexico’s total population amounted to approximately 120 million people. A little under two thirds of Mexico’s total population is of Mestizo ethnicity. The total population has steadily grown over the past decade, despite being the source to the largest migration flow between countries in the world; in 2010, around 11.6 million immigrants from Mexico lived in the United States. The migration flow between the United States and Mexico has however, decreased over the past ten years: Between 1995 and 2000, over 2.9 million migrants emigrated from Mexico to the United States. This was more than the double of migrants who emigrated from Mexico to the United States between 2005 and 2010. Each year, Mexico's population grows by about 1.24 percent compared to the previous year. Mexico City, the country’s capital and largest city, is home to approximately 8.6 million people.

South Africa is the sixth African country with the largest population, counting approximately 60.5 million individuals as of 2021. In 2023, the largest city in South Africa was Cape Town. The capital of Western Cape counted 3.4 million inhabitants, whereas South Africa's second largest city was Durban (eThekwini Municipality), with 3.1 million inhabitants. Note that when observing the number of inhabitants by municipality, Johannesburg is counted as largest city/municipality of South Africa.

From four provinces to nine provinces

Before Nelson Mandela became president in 1994, the country had four provinces, Cape of Good Hope, Natal, Orange Free State, and Transvaal and 10 “homelands” (also called Bantustans). The four larger regions were for the white population while the homelands for its black population. This system was dismantled following the new constitution of South Africa in 1996 and reorganized into nine provinces. Currently, Gauteng is the most populated province with around 15.9 million people residing there, followed by KwaZulu-Natal with 11.68 million inhabiting the province. As of 2022, Black African individuals were almost 81 percent of the total population in the country, while colored citizens followed amounting to around 5.34 million.

A diverse population

Although the majority of South Africans are identified as Black, the country’s population is far from homogenous, with different ethnic groups usually residing in the different “homelands”. This can be recognizable through the various languages used to communicate between the household members and externally. IsiZulu was the most common language of the nation with around a quarter of the population using it in- and outside of households. IsiXhosa and Afrikaans ranked second and third with roughly 15 percent and 12 percent, respectively.

Abstract

Polluted air is a major health hazard in developing countries. Improvements in pollution monitoring and statistical techniques during the last several decades have steadily enhanced the ability to measure the health effects of air pollution. Current methods can detect significant increases in the incidence of cardiopulmonary and respiratory diseases, coughing, bronchitis, and lung cancer, as well as premature deaths from these diseases resulting from elevated concentrations of ambient Particulate Matter (Holgate 1999).

Scarce public resources have limited the monitoring of atmospheric particulate matter (PM) concentrations in developing countries, despite their large potential health effects. As a result, policymakers in many developing countries remain uncertain about the exposure of their residents to PM air pollution. The Global Model of Ambient Particulates (GMAPS) is an attempt to bridge this information gap through an econometrically estimated model for predicting PM levels in world cities (Pandey et al. forthcoming).

The estimation model is based on the latest available monitored PM pollution data from the World Health Organization, supplemented by data from other reliable sources. The current model can be used to estimate PM levels in urban residential areas and non-residential pollution hotspots. The results of the model are used to project annual average ambient PM concentrations for residential and non-residential areas in 3,226 world cities with populations larger than 100,000, as well as national capitals.

The study finds wide, systematic variations in ambient PM concentrations, both across world cities and over time. PM concentrations have risen at a slower rate than total emissions. Overall emission levels have been rising, especially for poorer countries, at nearly 6 percent per year. PM concentrations have not increased by as much, due to improvements in technology and structural shifts in the world economy. Additionally, within-country variations in PM levels can diverge greatly (by a factor of 5 in some cases), because of the direct and indirect effects of geo-climatic factors.

The primary determinants of PM concentrations are the scale and composition of economic activity, population, the energy mix, the strength of local pollution regulation, and geographic and atmospheric conditions that affect pollutant dispersion in the atmosphere.

Geographic coverage

The database covers the following countries: Afghanistan Albania Algeria Andorra Angola
Antigua and Barbuda Argentina
Armenia Australia
Austria Azerbaijan
Bahamas, The
Bahrain Bangladesh
Barbados
Belarus Belgium Belize
Benin
Bhutan
Bolivia Bosnia and Herzegovina
Brazil
Brunei
Bulgaria
Burkina Faso
Burundi Cambodia
Cameroon
Canada
Cayman Islands
Central African Republic
Chad
Chile
China
Colombia
Comoros Congo, Dem. Rep.
Congo, Rep. Costa Rica
Cote d'Ivoire
Croatia Cuba
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark Dominica
Dominican Republic
Ecuador Egypt, Arab Rep.
El Salvador Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia
Faeroe Islands
Fiji
Finland France
Gabon
Gambia, The Georgia Germany Ghana
Greece
Grenada Guatemala
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Guyana
Haiti
Honduras
Hong Kong, China
Hungary Iceland India
Indonesia
Iran, Islamic Rep.
Iraq
Ireland Israel
Italy
Jamaica Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kenya
Korea, Dem. Rep.
Korea, Rep. Kuwait
Kyrgyz Republic Lao PDR Latvia
Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Liechtenstein
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Macao, China
Macedonia, FYR
Madagascar
Malawi
Malaysia
Maldives
Mali
Mauritania
Mexico
Moldova Mongolia
Morocco Mozambique
Myanmar Namibia Nepal
Netherlands Netherlands Antilles
New Caledonia
New Zealand Nicaragua
Niger
Nigeria Norway
Oman
Pakistan
Panama
Papua New Guinea
Paraguay
Peru
Philippines Poland
Portugal
Puerto Rico Qatar
Romania Russian Federation
Rwanda
Sao Tome and Principe
Saudi Arabia
Senegal Sierra Leone
Singapore
Slovak Republic Slovenia
Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa
Spain
Sri Lanka
St. Kitts and Nevis St. Lucia
St. Vincent and the Grenadines
Sudan
Suriname
Swaziland
Sweden
Switzerland Syrian Arab Republic
Tajikistan
Tanzania
Thailand
Togo
Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey
Turkmenistan
Uganda
Ukraine United Arab Emirates
United Kingdom
United States
Uruguay Uzbekistan
Vanuatu Venezuela, RB
Vietnam Virgin Islands (U.S.)
Yemen, Rep. Yugoslavia, FR (Serbia/Montenegro)
Zambia
Zimbabwe

Kind of data

Observation data/ratings [obs]

Mode of data collection

Other [oth]

The largest city in Finland is Helsinki with 674,500 inhabitants. Helsinki is the capital of Finland, and it is located in the south within the Uusimaa region. In 2023, the second largest city was Espoo, a city located in the Greater Helsinki metropolitan area, which had approximately 314,000 inhabitants. After the cities of Helsinki and Espoo, the third largest and most populous city outside the capital region was Tampere, with roughly 255,100 inhabitants.

The Finnish population is highly concentrated in southern Finland

The total population of Finland is roughly 5.6 million. Finland is one of the most sparsely populated countries in Europe, and the population is highly concentrated in the southern and southwestern parts of the country. Since 1915 the population of Finland grew steadily from 3.1 million to more than 5.6 million inhabitants. But the upwards trend slowed down in recent years.

The median age of the Finnish population is rising

While the population growth slowed down the Finnish population also got older. The media age increased from 27.8 years in 1950 to 39.4 years in 2000. The estimated median age for the Finnish population in 2022 was 42.6 years.

In 2023, approximately 988,943 people lived in Stockholm, making it not only the capital, but also the biggest city in Sweden. The second biggest city, Gothenburg (Göteborg) had about half as many inhabitants, with about 596,840 people. Move to the citySweden is a country with a very high urbanization rate, the likes of which is usually only seen in countries with large uninhabitable areas, such as Australia, or in nations with very little rural landscape and agrarian structures, like Cuba. So why do so few Swedes live in rural areas, even though based on total area, the country is one of the largest in Europe? The total population figures are the answer to this question, as Sweden has only about 10.3 million inhabitants as of 2018 – that’s only 25 inhabitants per square kilometer. Rural exodus or just par for the course?It is no mystery why most Swedes flock to the cities: Jobs, of course. Over 65 percent of Sweden’s gross domestic product is generated by the services sector, and agriculture only contributes about one percent to the GDP. Employment mirrors this, with 80 percent of the workforce being deployed in services, namely in foreign trade, telecommunications, and manufacturing, among other industries.

London was by far the largest urban agglomeration in the United Kingdom in 2023, with an estimated population of 9.65 million people, more than three times as large as Manchester, the UK’s second-biggest urban agglomeration. The agglomerations of Birmingham and Leeds / Bradford had the third and fourth-largest populations respectively, while the biggest city in Scotland, Glasgow, was the fifth largest. Largest cities in Europe Two cities in Europe had larger urban areas than London, with the Russian capital Moscow having a population of almost 12.7 million. The city of Paris, located just over 200 miles away from London, was the second-largest city in Europe, with a population of more than 11.2 million people. Paris was followed by London in terms of population-size, and then by the Spanish cities of Madrid and Barcelona, at 6.75 million and 5.68 million people respectively. Russia's second-biggest city; St. Petersburg had a population of 5.56 million, followed by Rome at 4.3 million, and Berlin at 3.5 million. London’s population growth Throughout the 1980s, the population of London fluctuated from a high of 6.81 million people in 1981 to a low of 6.73 million inhabitants in 1988. During the 1990s, the population of London increased once again, growing from 6.8 million at the start of the decade to 7.15 million by 1999. London's population has continued to grow since the turn of the century, reaching a peak of 8.96 million people in 2019, and is forecast to reach 9.8 million by 2043.

Mogadishu in Somalia led the ranking of cities with the highest population density in 2023, with 33,244 residents per square kilometer. When it comes to countries, Monaco is the most populated state worldwide.

Delhi was the largest city in terms of number of inhabitants in India in 2023.The capital city was estimated to house nearly 33 million people, with Mumbai ranking second that year. India's population estimate was 1.4 billion, ahead of China that same year.

The statistic shows the ten largest cities in Australia in 2021. In 2021, around 5.26 million people lived in Sydney and the surrounding area, making it the most populous city in Australia.

Kyiv is the largest city of Ukraine, with approximately 2.95 million inhabitants as of January 1, 2022. Kharkiv had the second-largest population of around 1.42 million, followed by Odesa and Dnipro. Economic situation in Ukraine Ukraine has a population of around 42 million inhabitants - close to 70 percent of which live in urban areas, with almost three million living in Ukraine’s largest city and capital, Kyiv. The city is located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River and is one of the largest in Europe. The country’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, is about half of Kyiv's size and located in the northeast. Kharkiv was the first city to be occupied by the Soviet Union in 1917 until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Since the collapse, Ukraine has been largely divided between east and west. Many inhabitants speak Ukrainian to the west, whereas Russian is dominant in parts of the east and south. Like Kharkiv, many of Ukraine’s other biggest cities which have fewer than one million inhabitants are located to the east of the country – a region which has uprooted and displaced many of its inhabitants because of the military actions that started in 2014. In 2015, Ukrainians across the country were affected by a huge spike in inflation, which reached near 49 percent. In the following years, it marked a decrease, measuring below three percent in 2020. The country’s GDP has also been significantly impacted by the crisis, which has left approximately 1.5 million Ukrainians internally displaced since 2014, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The unemployment rate was above nine percent in 2020.

The highest city in the world with a population of more than one million is La Paz. The Capital of Bolivia sits 3,869 meters above sea level, and is more than 1,000 meters higher than the second ranked city - Quito. La Paz is also higher than Mt. Fuji in Japan, which has a height of 3,776 meters. Many of the world's highest cities are located in South America. The only city in North America that makes the top 20 list is Denver, Colorado, which has an altitude of 1,673 meters.

The city of Paris in France had an estimated gross domestic product of 757.6 billion Euros in 2021, the most of any European city. Paris was followed by the spanish capital, Madrid, which had a GDP of 237.5 billion Euros, and the Irish capital, Dublin at 230 billion Euros. Milan, in the prosperous north of Italy, had a GDP of 228.4 billion Euros, 65 billion euros larger than the Italian capital Rome, and was the largest non-capital city in terms of GDP in Europe. The engine of Europe Among European countries, Germany had by far the largest economy, with a gross domestic product of over 4.18 trillion Euros. The United Kingdom or France have been Europe's second largest economy since the 1980s, depending on the year, with forecasts suggesting France will overtake the UK going into the 2020s. Germany however, has been the biggest European economy for some time, with five cities (Munich, Berlin, Hamburg, Stuttgart and Frankfurt) among the 15 largest European cities by GDP. Europe's largest cities In 2023, Moscow was the largest european city, with a population of nearly 12.7 million. Paris was the largest city in western Europe, with a population of over 11 million, while London was Europe's third-largest city at 9.6 million inhabitants.

In 2025, the degree of urbanization worldwide was at 58 percent. North America as well as Latin America and the Caribbean were the regions with the highest level of urbanization, with over four-fifths of the population residing in urban areas. The degree of urbanization defines the share of the population living in areas that are defined as "cities". On the other hand, less than half of Africa's population lives in urban settlements. Globally, China accounts for over one-quarter of the built-up areas of more than 500,000 inhabitants. The definition of a city differs across various world regions - some countries count settlements with 100 houses or more as urban, while others only include the capital of a country or provincial capitals in their count. Largest agglomerations worldwideThough North America is the most urbanized continent, no U.S. city was among the top ten urban agglomerations worldwide in 2023. Tokyo-Yokohama in Japan was the largest urban area in the world that year, with 37.7 million inhabitants. New York ranked 13th, with 21.4 million inhabitants. Eight of the 10 most populous cities are located in Asia. ConnectivityIt may be hard to imagine how the reality will look in 2050, with 70 percent of the global population living in cities, but some statistics illustrate the ways urban living differs from suburban and rural living. American urbanites may lead more “connected” (i.e. internet-connected) lives than their rural and/or suburban counterparts. As of 2021, around 89 percent of people living in urban areas owned a smartphone. Internet usage was also higher in cities than in rural areas. On the other hand, rural areas always have, and always will attract those who want to escape the rush of the city.

In 2021, around 27.8 million people were estimated to be living in the urban area of Shanghai. Shanghai was the largest city in China in 2021, followed by Beijing, with around 20.9 million inhabitants.

The rise of the new first-tier cities

The past decades have seen widespread and rapid urbanization and demographic transition in China. While the four first-tier megacities, namely Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen, are still highly attractive to people and companies due to their strong ability to synergize the competitive economic and social resources, some lower-tier cities are already facing declining populations, especially those in the northeastern region. Below the original four first-tier cities, 15 quickly developing cities are sharing the cake of the moving population with improving business vitality and GDP growth potential. These new first-tier cities are either municipalities directly under the central government, such as Chongqing and Tianjin, or regional central cities and provincial capitals, like Chengdu and Wuhan, or open coastal cities in the economically developed eastern regions.

From urbanization to metropolitanization

As more and more Chinese people migrate to large cities for better opportunities and quality of life, the ongoing urbanization has further evolved into metropolitanization. Among those metropolitans, Shenzhen's population exceeded 17.6 million in 2020, a nearly 70 percent increase from a decade ago, compared to eight percent in the already densely populated Shanghai. However, with people rushing into the big-four cities, the cost of housing, and other living standards, are soaring. As of 2020, the average sales price for residential real estate in Shenzhen exceeded 56,800 yuan per square meter. As a result, the fast-growing and more cost-effective new first-tier cities would be more appealing in the coming years. Furthermore, Shanghai and Beijing have set plans to control the size of their population to 25 and 23 million, respectively, before 2035.