In 2023, the population of the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin metropolitan area in the United States was about 9.26 million people. This was a slight decrease from the previous year, which was about 9.27 million.

Graph and download economic data for Resident Population in Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI (MSA) (CHIPOP) from 2000 to 2022 about Chicago, WI, IN, IL, residents, population, and USA.

Historical dataset of population level and growth rate for the Chicago metro area from 1950 to 2025.

In 2023, the metropolitan area of New York-Newark-Jersey City had the biggest population in the United States. Based on annual estimates from the census, the metropolitan area had around 19.5 million inhabitants, which was a slight decrease from the previous year. The Los Angeles and Chicago metro areas rounded out the top three. What is a metropolitan statistical area? In general, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) is a core urbanized area with a population of at least 50,000 inhabitants – the smallest MSA is Carson City, with an estimated population of nearly 56,000. The urban area is made bigger by adjacent communities that are socially and economically linked to the center. MSAs are particularly helpful in tracking demographic change over time in large communities and allow officials to see where the largest pockets of inhabitants are in the country. How many MSAs are in the United States? There were 421 metropolitan statistical areas across the U.S. as of July 2021. The largest city in each MSA is designated the principal city and will be the first name in the title. An additional two cities can be added to the title, and these will be listed in population order based on the most recent census. So, in the example of New York-Newark-Jersey City, New York has the highest population, while Jersey City has the lowest. The U.S. Census Bureau conducts an official population count every ten years, and the new count is expected to be announced by the end of 2030.

A dataset listing Illinois cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing Illinois counties by population for 2024.

In 2023, the real GDP of the Los Angeles metro area amount to around 1.08 trillion U.S. dollars, and increase after 2021. The overall quarterly GDP growth in the United States can be found here. Gross domestic product of Los AngelesWith a population of over 12.8 million inhabitants in 2023, Los Angeles is the second-largest city in America, following only New York. The Los Angeles metro area also ranked second among U.S. metro areas in terms of gross metropolitan product, second again only to New York City metro area, which came in with a GMP of 1.99 trillion U.S. dollars to Los Angeles’ 1.13 trillion U.S. dollars in the fiscal year of 2021. Chicago metro area ranked third with GMP of 757.2 billion U.S. dollars. Additional detailed statistics about GDP in the United States is available here. Despite Los Angeles’ high GDP, L.A. did not do as well as some cities in terms of median household income. Los Angeles ranked 9th with a median household income of 76,135 U.S. dollars annually in 2022. This was slightly higher than the median household income of the United States in 2022, which came in at 74,580 U.S. dollars annually. Located in Southern California, Los Angeles is home to Hollywood, the famous epicenter of the U.S. film and television industries. The United States is one of the leading film markets worldwide, producing 449 films in 2022, many of them produced by Hollywood-based studios. In 2018, movie ticket sales in North America generated over 11.89 billion U.S. dollars in box office revenue. Famous Hollywood actresses earn millions annually, with the best paid, Sofia Vergara, earning 43 million U.S. dollars in 2020. Second on the list was Angelina Jolie with earnings of 35.5 million U.S. dollars.

In terms of population size, the sex ratio in the United States favors females, although the gender gap is remaining stable. In 2010, there were around 5.17 million more women, with the difference projected to decrease to around 3 million by 2027.

Gender ratios by U.S. state In the United States, the resident population was estimated to be around 331.89 million in 2021. The gender distribution of the nation has remained steady for several years, with women accounting for approximately 51.1 percent of the population since 2013. Females outnumbered males in the majority of states across the country in 2020, and there were eleven states where the gender ratio favored men.

Metro areas by population National differences between male and female populations can also be analyzed by metropolitan areas. In general, a metropolitan area is a region with a main city at its center and adjacent communities that are all connected by social and economic factors. The largest metro areas in the U.S. are New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. In 2019, there were more women than men in all three of those areas, but Jackson, Missouri was the metro area with the highest share of female population.

How many incorporated places are registered in the U.S.?

There were 19,502 incorporated places registered in the United States as of July 31, 2019. 16,410 had a population under 10,000 while, in contrast, only 10 cities had a population of one million or more.

Small-town America

Suffice it to say, almost nothing is more idealized in the American imagination than small-town America. When asked where they would prefer to live, 30 percent of Americans reported that they would prefer to live in a small town. Americans tend to prefer small-town living due to a perceived slower pace of life, close-knit communities, and a more affordable cost of living when compared to large cities.

An increasing population

Despite a preference for small-town life, metropolitan areas in the U.S. still see high population figures, with the New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago metro areas being the most populous in the country. Metro and state populations are projected to increase by 2040, so while some may move to small towns to escape city living, those small towns may become more crowded in the upcoming decades.

There are three components of change: births, deaths, and migration. The change in the population from births and deaths is often combined and referred to as natural increase or natural change. Populations grow or shrink depending on if they gain people faster than they lose them. Looking at an area’s unique combination of natural change and migration helps us understand why its population is changing, and how quickly the change is occurring.Natural IncreaseNatural change is the difference between births and deaths in a population. Often times, natural change is positive, which means that more babies are being born than people are dying. This positive natural change is referred to as natural increase. Examples of natural increase exist across the United States, one being the Salt Lake City metro area in Utah. Between 2014 and 2015, Salt Lake City had around 19,100 births and 6,400 deaths. Since there were about 12,700 more births than deaths, Salt Lake City had a natural increase of about 12,700 people, making natural increase a key reason why its population grew over the year.The opposite of natural increase is called natural decrease, where more people are dying than babies being born, which can cause a population to shrink. Areas with aging populations often have natural decrease. Two states had natural decrease between 2014 and 2015, Maine and West Virginia. Between 2014 and 2015, Maine had 450 more deaths than births and West Virginia had 940 more deaths than births. In both cases, natural decrease was one of the reasons why their populations shrank between 2014 and 2015 in our latest estimates.MigrationMigration is the movement of people from one area to another. It is often expressed as net migration, which is the difference between how many people move into and out of an area. When net migration is positive, a population has more people moving in than out. We split migration into domestic migration and international migration.Domestic migration refers to people moving between areas within the United States, and is often one of the largest contributors to population change. Regionally, the South gains the most net domestic migrants, with roughly 440,000 more people moving into southern states than leaving them between 2014 and 2015. Sometimes net domestic migration is negative, in which case more people are moving away than are moving in. The Chicago metro area in Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin lost about 80,000 people through migration between 2014 and 2015, which is consistent with a long-standing pattern of negative net domestic migration for the metro area.International migration refers to people moving into and out of the United States, and consists of a diverse group of people such as foreign-born immigrants from many countries around the world, members of the U.S. Armed Forces, and U.S. citizens working abroad. Some areas, like the Miami metro area in Florida, grow (in part) due to net international migration. Miami gained about 70,000 net international migrants between 2014 and 2015, making net international migration a major factor in Miami’s population growth.

This statistic shows the population of the top twenty largest urban agglomerations in the United States from 2018 to 2035. By 2035, the population of the New York-Newark agglomeration is projected to be roughly **** million people.

In 2022, the New Orleans-Metairie, LA metro area recorded the highest homicide rate of U.S. cities with a population over 250,000, at **** homicides per 100,000 residents, followed by the Memphis, TN-MS-AR metro area. However, homicide data was not recorded in all U.S. metro areas, meaning that there may be some cities with a higher homicide rate. St. Louis St. Louis, which had a murder and nonnegligent manslaughter rate of **** in 2022, is the second-largest city by population in Missouri. It is home to many famous treasures, such as the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team, Washington University in St. Louis, the Saint Louis Zoo, and the renowned Gateway Arch. It is also home to many corporations, such as Monsanto, Arch Coal, and Emerson Electric. The economy of St. Louis is centered around business and healthcare, and boasts ten Fortune 500 companies. Crime in St. Louis Despite all of this, St. Louis suffers from high levels of crime and violence. As of 2023, it was listed as the seventh most dangerous city in the world as a result of their extremely high murder rate. Not only does St. Louis have one of the highest homicide rates in the United States, it also reports one of the highest numbers of violent crimes. Despite high crime levels, the GDP of the St. Louis metropolitan area has been increasing since 2001.

This graph shows the GDP of the Los Angeles metro area in 2022, by industry. In 2022, its GDP amounted to about **** trillion U.S. dollars. About **** billion U.S. dollars were generated by the manufacturing industry. The overall quarterly GDP growth in the United States can be found here.

Gross domestic product of Los Angeles

With a population of over *** million inhabitants in 2011, Los Angeles is the second largest city in America, following only New York. The Los Angeles metro area also ranked second among U.S. metro areas in terms of gross metropolitan product, second again only to New York City metro area, which came in with a GMP of USD ***** trillion to Los Angeles’ *** billion USD in 2011. Chicago metro area ranked third with GMP of *** billion U.S. dollars. Washington metro area ranked fourth with *** billion U.S. dollars in 2011. Additional detailed statistics about GDP and GMP in the United States is available here.

Despite Los Angeles’ high GDP, L.A. did not do as well as some cities in terms of median household income. Los Angeles ranked 11th with a median household income of ****** U.S. dollars annually in 2013. This was lower than the median household income of the United States in 2013, which came in at ****** U.S. dollars annually.

Located in Southern California, Los Angeles is home to Hollywood, the famous epicenter of the U.S. film and television industries. The United States is one of the leading film markets worldwide, producing *** films in 2011, many of them produced by Hollywood-based studios. In 2012, movie ticket sales in North America generated over **** billion U.S. dollars in box office revenue. Famous Hollywood actresses earn millions annually, with the best paid, Angelina Jolie, earning ** million U.S. dollars between ********* and *********. Second on the list was Jennifer Lawrence with earnings of ** million U.S. dollars.

The two countries with the greatest shares of the world's Jewish population are the United States and Israel. The United States had been a hub of Jewish immigration since the nineteenth century, as Jewish people sought to escape persecution in Europe by emigrating across the Atlantic. The Jewish population in the U.S. is largely congregated in major urban areas, such as New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago, with the New York metropolitan area being the city with the second largest Jewish population worldwide, after Tel Aviv, Israel. Israel is the world's only officially Jewish state, having been founded in 1948 following the first Arab-Israeli War. While Jews had been emigrating to the holy lands since the nineteenth century, when they were controlled by the Ottoman Empire, immigration increased rapidly following the establishment of the state of Israel. Jewish communities in Eastern Europe who had survived the Holocaust saw Israel as a haven from persecution, while the state encouraged immigration from Jewish communities in other regions, notably the Middle East & North Africa. Smaller Jewish communities remain in Europe in countries such as France, the UK, and Germany, and in other countries which were hotspots for Jewish migration in the twentieth century, such as Canada and Argentina.