Monaco led the ranking for countries with the highest population density in 2024, with nearly 26,000 residents per square kilometer. The Special Administrative Region of Macao came in second, followed by Singapore. The world’s second smallest country Monaco is the world’s second-smallest country, with an area of about two square kilometers and a population of only around 40,000. It is a constitutional monarchy located by the Mediterranean Sea, and while Monaco is not part of the European Union, it does participate in some EU policies. The country is perhaps most famous for the Monte Carlo casino and for hosting the Monaco Grand Prix, the world's most prestigious Formula One race. The global population Globally, the population density per square kilometer is about 60 inhabitants, and Asia is the most densely populated region in the world. The global population is increasing rapidly, so population density is only expected to increase. In 1950, for example, the global population stood at about 2.54 billion people, and it reached over eight billion during 2023.

Census data reveals that population density varies noticeably from area to area. Small area census data do a better job depicting where the crowded neighborhoods are. In this map, the yellow areas of highest density range from 30,000 to 150,000 persons per square kilometer. In those areas, if the people were spread out evenly across the area, there would be just 4 to 9 meters between them. Very high density areas exceed 7,000 persons per square kilometer. High density areas exceed 5,200 persons per square kilometer. The last categories break at 3,330 persons per square kilometer, and 1,500 persons per square kilometer.This dataset is comprised of multiple sources. All of the demographic data are from Michael Bauer Research with the exception of the following countries:Australia: Esri Australia and MapData ServicesCanada: Esri Canada and EnvironicsFrance: Esri FranceGermany: Esri Germany and NexigaIndia: Esri India and IndicusJapan: Esri JapanSouth Korea: Esri Korea and OPENmateSpain: Esri España and AISUnited States: Esri Demographics

In 2023, Washington, D.C. had the highest population density in the United States, with 11,130.69 people per square mile. As a whole, there were about 94.83 residents per square mile in the U.S., and Alaska was the state with the lowest population density, with 1.29 residents per square mile. The problem of population density Simply put, population density is the population of a country divided by the area of the country. While this can be an interesting measure of how many people live in a country and how large the country is, it does not account for the degree of urbanization, or the share of people who live in urban centers. For example, Russia is the largest country in the world and has a comparatively low population, so its population density is very low. However, much of the country is uninhabited, so cities in Russia are much more densely populated than the rest of the country. Urbanization in the United States While the United States is not very densely populated compared to other countries, its population density has increased significantly over the past few decades. The degree of urbanization has also increased, and well over half of the population lives in urban centers.

this graph was created in R:

https://www.googleapis.com/download/storage/v1/b/kaggle-user-content/o/inbox%2F16731800%2F55a15c27e578216565ab65e502f9ecf8%2Fgraph1.png?generation=1730674251775717&alt=media" alt=""> https://www.googleapis.com/download/storage/v1/b/kaggle-user-content/o/inbox%2F16731800%2F0b481e4d397700978fe5cf15932dbc68%2Fgraph2.png?generation=1730674259213775&alt=media" alt="">

driven primarily by high birth rates in developing countries and advancements in healthcare. According to the United Nations, the global population surpassed 8 billion in 2023, marking a critical milestone in human history. This growth, however, is unevenly distributed across continents and countries, leading to varied population densities and urban pressures.

Surface area and population density play vital roles in shaping the demographic and economic landscape of each country. For instance, countries with large land masses such as Russia, Canada, and Australia have low population densities despite their significant populations, as vast portions of their land are sparsely populated or uninhabitable. Conversely, nations like Bangladesh and South Korea exhibit extremely high population densities due to smaller land areas combined with large populations.

Population density, measured as the number of people per square kilometer, affects resource availability, environmental sustainability, and quality of life. High-density areas face greater challenges in housing, infrastructure, and environmental management, often experiencing increased pollution and resource strain. In contrast, low-density areas may struggle with underdeveloped infrastructure and limited access to services due to the dispersed population.

Urbanization trends are another important aspect of these dynamics. As people migrate to cities seeking better economic opportunities, urban areas grow more densely populated, amplifying the need for efficient land use and sustainable urban planning. The UN reports that over half of the world’s population currently resides in urban areas, with this figure expected to rise to nearly 70% by 2050. This shift requires nations to balance population growth and density with sustainable development strategies to ensure a higher quality of life and environmental stewardship for future generations.

Through an understanding of population size, surface area, and density, policymakers can better address challenges related to urban development, rural depopulation, and resource allocation, supporting a balanced approach to population management and economic development.

This layer presents population density data by county for states bordering the U.S. Gulf, sourced from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 Census Demographic and Housing Characteristics. Population density is displayed as the number of people per square kilometer. Broadly speaking, population density indicates how many people would inhabit one square kilometer if the population were evenly distributed across the area. However, population distribution is uneven. People tend to cluster in urban areas, while those in rural regions are spread out over a much more sparsely populated landscape. Population density is a crucial metric for understanding and managing human population dynamics and their effects on society and the environment. It helps assess various environmental challenges, including urban sprawl, pollution, habitat loss, and resource depletion. Coastal areas frequently experience high population density due to urbanization, influencing land use, housing, and infrastructure development. This density can also stimulate tourism and recreation, necessitating careful planning for facilities, transportation, and environmental protection. Additionally, coastal regions are more susceptible to natural disasters such as hurricanes and flooding, making population density data essential for developing effective evacuation plans and emergency services. Data: U.S. Census BureauDocumentation: U.S. Census Bureau This is a component of the Gulf Data Atlas (V2.0) for the Socioeconomic Conditions topic area.

In the last century, the global population has increased by billions of people. And it is still growing. Job opportunities in large cities have caused an influx of people to these already packed locations. This has resulted in an increase in population density for these cities, which are now forced to expand in order to accommodate the growing population. Population density is the average number of people per unit, usually miles or kilometers, of land area. Understanding and mapping population density is important. Experts can use this information to inform decisions around resource allocation, natural disaster relief, and new infrastructure projects. Infectious disease scientists use these maps to understand the spread of infectious disease, a topic that has become critical after the COVID-19 global pandemic.While a useful tool for decision and policymakers, it is important to understand the limitations of population density. Population density is most effective in small scale places—cities or neighborhoods—where people are evenly distributed. Whereas at a larger scale, such as the state, region, or province level, population density could vary widely as it includes a mix of urban, suburban, and rural places. All of these areas have a vastly different population density, but they are averaged together. This means urban areas could appear to have fewer people than they really do, while rural areas would seem to have more. Use this map to explore the estimated global population density (people per square kilometer) in 2020. Where do people tend to live? Why might they choose those places? Do you live in a place with a high population density or a low one?

Context

This is a dataset of the most highly populated city (if applicable) in a form easy to join with the COVID19 Global Forecasting (Week 1) dataset. You can see how to use it in this kernel

Content

There are four columns. The first two correspond to the columns from the original COVID19 Global Forecasting (Week 1) dataset. The other two is the highest population density, at city level, for the given country/state. Note that some countries are very small and in those cases the population density reflects the entire country. Since the original dataset has a few cruise ships as well, I've added them there.

Acknowledgements

Thanks a lot to Kaggle for this competition that gave me the opportunity to look closely at some data and understand this problem better.

Inspiration

Summary: I believe that the square root of the population density should relate to the logistic growth factor of the SIR model. I think the SEIR model isn't applicable due to any intervention being too late for a fast-spreading virus like this, especially in places with dense populations.

After playing with the data provided in COVID19 Global Forecasting (Week 1) (and everything else online or media) a bit, one thing becomes clear. They have nothing to do with epidemiology. They reflect sociopolitical characteristics of a country/state and, more specifically, the reactivity and attitude towards testing.

The testing method used (PCR tests) means that what we measure could potentially be a proxy for the number of people infected during the last 3 weeks, i.e the growth (with lag). It's not how many people have been infected and recovered. Antibody or serology tests would measure that, and by using them, we could go back to normality faster... but those will arrive too late. Way earlier, China will have experimentally shown that it's safe to go back to normal as soon as your number of newly infected per day is close to zero.

https://www.googleapis.com/download/storage/v1/b/kaggle-user-content/o/inbox%2F197482%2F429e0fdd7f1ce86eba882857ac7a735e%2Fcovid-summary.png?generation=1585072438685236&alt=media" alt="">

My view, as a person living in NYC, about this virus, is that by the time governments react to media pressure, to lockdown or even test, it's too late. In dense areas, everyone susceptible has already amble opportunities to be infected. Especially for a virus with 5-14 days lag between infections and symptoms, a period during which hosts spread it all over on subway, the conditions are hopeless. Active populations have already been exposed, mostly asymptomatic and recovered. Sensitive/older populations are more self-isolated/careful in affluent societies (maybe this isn't the case in North Italy). As the virus finishes exploring the active population, it starts penetrating the more isolated ones. At this point in time, the first fatalities happen. Then testing starts. Then the media and the lockdown. Lockdown seems overly effective because it coincides with the tail of the disease spread. It helps slow down the virus exploring the long-tail of sensitive population, and we should all contribute by doing it, but it doesn't cause the end of the disease. If it did, then as soon as people were back in the streets (see China), there would be repeated outbreaks.

Smart politicians will test a lot because it will make their condition look worse. It helps them demand more resources. At the same time, they will have a low rate of fatalities due to large denominator. They can take credit for managing well a disproportionally major crisis - in contrast to people who didn't test.

We were lucky this time. We, Westerners, have woken up to the potential of a pandemic. I'm sure we will give further resources for prevention. Additionally, we will be more open-minded, helping politicians to have more direct responses. We will also require them to be more responsible in their messages and reactions.

At high densities, land uses get close enough to each other to support walk, bike, and transit modes above 60% of total trips. The San Francisco Bay Area census was used to define five density levels: rural, exurban, suburban, central city, and urban core. The urban core definition, over 50 persons per neighborhood acre, is much denser than in other research. The California Household Transportation Survey supplied new data on block group area, population, trip stages, trip distances, trip time, and travel mode by density. The National Household Transportation Survey supplied block group population, density, travel mode, and income data. Both sources show a strong nonlinear relationship going from rural to urban core: auto miles and trips decrease as walk and transit miles and trips increase. With density, people travel fewer miles and spend less time traveling. High-income households in dense areas travel far fewer miles than those living at higher densities. With sufficient density, complementary features play a role in furthering mode shift. For planning purposes, the need for parking greatly declines. The findings are a basis for similar research elsewhere on high densities and complementary features.

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

United States US: Population Density: People per Square Km data was reported at 35.608 Person/sq km in 2017. This records an increase from the previous number of 35.355 Person/sq km for 2016. United States US: Population Density: People per Square Km data is updated yearly, averaging 26.948 Person/sq km from Dec 1961 (Median) to 2017, with 57 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 35.608 Person/sq km in 2017 and a record low of 20.056 Person/sq km in 1961. United States US: Population Density: People per Square Km data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.World Bank.WDI: Population and Urbanization Statistics. Population density is midyear population divided by land area in square kilometers. Population is based on the de facto definition of population, which counts all residents regardless of legal status or citizenship--except for refugees not permanently settled in the country of asylum, who are generally considered part of the population of their country of origin. Land area is a country's total area, excluding area under inland water bodies, national claims to continental shelf, and exclusive economic zones. In most cases the definition of inland water bodies includes major rivers and lakes.; ; Food and Agriculture Organization and World Bank population estimates.; Weighted average;

As of 2025, Asia was the most densely populated region of the world, with nearly 156 inhabitants per square kilometer, whereas Oceania's population density was just over five inhabitants per square kilometer.

Knowing where people are is crucial for policymakers, particularly for the efficient allocation of resources in their country and the development of effective, people-centred policies. However, rural population distribution maps suffer from biases related to the type of dataset used to predict population density, such as the use of nighttime lights datasets in areas without electricity. This renders widely used datasets irrelevant in rural areas and biases nationwide models towards urban areas. To compensate for such biases, we aim at understanding the importance and relationship between water-related covariates and population densities in a random forest model across the urban-rural gradient. By extending a recursive feature elimination framework, we show that commonly used covariates are only selected when modelling the whole country. However, once the highest density areas are removed, water-related characteristics (especially distance to boreholes) become important covariates of population density outside of densely populated areas. This has important implications for modelling population in rural areas, including for a better estimation of the size of remote communities. When seeking to produce country-level population maps, we encourage further studies to explicitly account for rural areas by considering the urban-rural gradient and encourage the use of water-related datasets.

Population density per pixel at 100 metre resolution. WorldPop provides estimates of numbers of people residing in each 100x100m grid cell for every low and middle income country. Through ingegrating cencus, survey, satellite and GIS datasets in a flexible machine-learning framework, high resolution maps of population counts and densities for 2000-2020 are produced, along with accompanying metadata. DATASET: Alpha version 2010 and 2015 estimates of numbers of people per grid square, with national totals adjusted to match UN population division estimates (http://esa.un.org/wpp/) and remaining unadjusted. REGION: Asia SPATIAL RESOLUTION: 0.000833333 decimal degrees (approx 100m at the equator) PROJECTION: Geographic, WGS84 UNITS: Estimated persons per grid square MAPPING APPROACH: Land cover based, as described in: Linard, C., Gilbert, M., Snow, R.W., Noor, A.M. and Tatem, A.J., 2012, Population distribution, settlement patterns and accessibility across Africa in 2010, PLoS ONE, 7(2): e31743. FORMAT: Geotiff (zipped using 7-zip (open access tool): www.7-zip.org) FILENAMES: Example - AGO10adjv4.tif = Angola (AGO) population count map for 2010 (10) adjusted to match UN national estimates (adj), version 4 (v4). Population maps are updated to new versions when improved census or other input data become available. Vietnam data available from WorldPop here. Data and Resources TIFF Vietnam - Population density (2015) DATASET: Alpha version 2010 and 2015 estimates of numbers of people per grid...

Please cite our paper if you publish material based on those datasets

G. Khodabandelou, V. Gauthier, M. El-Yacoubi, M. Fiore, "Estimation of Static and Dynamic Urban Populations with Mobile Network Metadata", in IEEE Trans. on Mobile Computing, 2018 (in Press). 10.1109/TMC.2018.2871156

Abstract

Communication-enabled devices that are physically carried by individuals are today pervasive,
which opens unprecedented opportunities for collecting digital metadata about the mobility of large populations. In this paper, we propose a novel methodology for the estimation of people density at metropolitan scales, using subscriber presence metadata collected by a mobile operator. We show that our approach suits the estimation of static population densities, i.e., of the distribution of dwelling units per urban area contained in traditional censuses. Specifically, it achieves higher accuracy than that granted by previous equivalent solutions. In addition, our approach enables the estimation of dynamic population densities, i.e., the time-varying distributions of people in a conurbation. Our results build on significant real-world mobile network metadata and relevant ground-truth information in multiple urban scenarios.

Dataset Columns

This dataset cover one month of data taken during the month of April 2015 for three Italian cities: Rome, Milan, Turin. The raw data has been provided during the Telecom Italia Big Data Challenge (http://www.telecomitalia.com/tit/en/innovazione/archivio/big-data-challenge-2015.html)

1. grid_id: the coordinate of the grid can be retrieved with the shapefile of a given city
2. date: format Y-M-D H:M:S
4. landuse_label: the land use label has been computed by through method described in [2]
5. population: Census population of a given grid block as defined by the Istituto nazionale di statistica (ISTAT https://www.istat.it/en/censuses) in 2011
6. estimation: Dynamics density population estimation (in person) as the result of the method described in [1]
7. area: surface of the "grid id" considered in km^2
8. geometry: the shape of the area considered with the EPSG:3003 coordinate system (only with quilt)

Note

Due to legal constraints, we cannot share directly the original data from the Telecom Italia Big Data Challenge we used to build this dataset.

Easy access to this dataset with quilt

Install the dataset repository:

$ quilt install vgauthier/DynamicPopEstimate

Use the dataset with a Panda Dataframe

>>> from quilt.data.vgauthier import DynamicPopEstimate
>>> import pandas as pd
>>> df = pd.DataFrame(DynamicPopEstimate.rome())

Use the dataset with a GeoPanda Dataframe

>>> from quilt.data.vgauthier import DynamicPopEstimate
>>> import geopandas as gpd
>>> df = gpd.DataFrame(DynamicPopEstimate.rome())

References

[1] G. Khodabandelou, V. Gauthier, M. El-Yacoubi, M. Fiore, "Population estimation from mobile network traffic metadata", in proc of the 17th International Symposium on A World of Wireless, Mobile and Multimedia Networks (WoWMoM), pp. 1 - 9, 2016.

[2] A. Furno, M. Fiore, R. Stanica, C. Ziemlicki, and Z. Smoreda, "A tale of ten cities: Characterizing signatures of mobile traffic in urban areas," IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing, Volume: 16, Issue: 10, 2017.

Population density per pixel at 100 metre resolution. WorldPop provides estimates of numbers of people residing in each 100x100m grid cell for every low and middle income country. Through ingegrating cencus, survey, satellite and GIS datasets in a flexible machine-learning framework, high resolution maps of population counts and densities for 2000-2020 are produced, along with accompanying metadata. DATASET: Alpha version 2010 and 2015 estimates of numbers of people per grid square, with national totals adjusted to match UN population division estimates (http://esa.un.org/wpp/) and remaining unadjusted. REGION: Africa SPATIAL RESOLUTION: 0.000833333 decimal degrees (approx 100m at the equator) PROJECTION: Geographic, WGS84 UNITS: Estimated persons per grid square MAPPING APPROACH: Land cover based, as described in: Linard, C., Gilbert, M., Snow, R.W., Noor, A.M. and Tatem, A.J., 2012, Population distribution, settlement patterns and accessibility across Africa in 2010, PLoS ONE, 7(2): e31743. FORMAT: Geotiff (zipped using 7-zip (open access tool): www.7-zip.org) FILENAMES: Example - AGO10adjv4.tif = Angola (AGO) population count map for 2010 (10) adjusted to match UN national estimates (adj), version 4 (v4). Population maps are updated to new versions when improved census or other input data become available. Sudan data available from WorldPop here.

China is a vast and diverse country and population density in different regions varies greatly. In 2023, the estimated population density of the administrative area of Shanghai municipality reached about 3,922 inhabitants per square kilometer, whereas statistically only around three people were living on one square kilometer in Tibet. Population distribution in China China's population is unevenly distributed across the country: while most people are living in the southeastern half of the country, the northwestern half – which includes the provinces and autonomous regions of Tibet, Xinjiang, Qinghai, Gansu, and Inner Mongolia – is only sparsely populated. Even the inhabitants of a single province might be unequally distributed within its borders. This is significantly influenced by the geography of each region, and is especially the case in the Guangdong, Fujian, or Sichuan provinces due to their mountain ranges. The Chinese provinces with the largest absolute population size are Guangdong in the south, Shandong in the east and Henan in Central China. Urbanization and city population Urbanization is one of the main factors which have been reshaping China over the last four decades. However, when comparing the size of cities and urban population density, one has to bear in mind that data often refers to the administrative area of cities or urban units, which might be much larger than the contiguous built-up area of that city. The administrative area of Beijing municipality, for example, includes large rural districts, where only around 200 inhabitants are living per square kilometer on average, while roughly 20,000 residents per square kilometer are living in the two central city districts. This is the main reason for the huge difference in population density between the four Chinese municipalities Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing shown in many population statistics.

The population density picture of Boston is generally a story of two Bostons: the high density central and northern neighborhoods, and the low density southern neighborhoods.The highest density areas of Boston are particularly concentrated in Brighton, Allston, and the Fenway area, areas of the city with large numbers of college students and young adults. There is also high population density in areas such as the Back Bay, the South End, Charlestown, the North End, and South Boston. These are all relatively small areas geographically, but have housing stock conducive to population density (e.g. multi-family dwelling units, row housing, large apartment buildings). The southern neighborhoods, specifically Hyde Park and West Roxbury, have significant numbers of people living in them, but lots sizes tend to be much larger. These areas of the city also tend to have more single family dwelling units. In that, there are fewer people per square mile than places north in the city. Census data reveals that population density varies noticeably from area to area. Small area census data do a better job depicting where the crowded neighborhoods are. In this map, areas of highest density exceed 30,000 persons per square kilometer. Very high density areas exceed 7,000 persons per square kilometer. High density areas exceed 5,200 persons per square kilometer. The last categories break at 3,330 persons per square kilometer, and 1,500 persons per square kilometer.How to make this map for your city

Global landscapes are changing due to human activities with consequences for both biodiversity and ecosystems. For single species, terrestrial mammal population densities have shown mixed responses to human pressure, with both increasing and decreasing densities reported in the literature. How the impacts of human activities on mammal populations translates into altered global density patterns remains unclear. Here we aim to disentangle the effect of human impacts on large-scale patterns of mammal population densities using a global dataset of 6729 population density estimates for 468 mammal species (representing 59% and 44% of mammalian orders and families). We fitted a mixed effect model to explain the variation in density based on a 1-degree resolution as a function of the Human Footprint Index (HFI), a global proxy of direct and indirect human disturbances, while accounting for body mass, trophic level and primary productivity (Normalized Vegetation Index; NDVI). We found a signific...

As of 2023, the population density in London was by far the highest number of people per square km in the UK, at *****. Of the other regions and countries which constitute the United Kingdom, North West England was the next most densely populated area at *** people per square kilometer. Scotland, by contrast, is the most sparsely populated country or region in the United Kingdom, with only ** people per square kilometer. Countries, regions, and cities According to the official mid-year population estimate, the population of the United Kingdom was just almost **** million in 2022. Most of the population lived in England, where an estimated **** million people resided, followed by Scotland at **** million, Wales at **** million and finally Northern Ireland at just over *** million. Within England, the South East was the region with the highest population at almost **** million, followed by the London region at around *** million. In terms of urban areas, Greater London is the largest city in the United Kingdom, followed by Greater Manchester and Birmingham in the North West and West Midlands regions of England. London calling London's huge size in relation to other UK cities is also reflected by its economic performance. In 2021, London's GDP was approximately *** billion British pounds, almost a quarter of UK GDP overall. In terms of GDP per capita, Londoners had a GDP per head of ****** pounds, compared with an average of ****** for the country as a whole. Productivity, expressed as by output per hour worked, was also far higher in London than the rest of the country. In 2021, London was around **** percent more productive than the rest of the country, with South East England the only other region where productivity was higher than the national average.

Population density per pixel at 100 metre resolution. WorldPop provides estimates of numbers of people residing in each 100x100m grid cell for every low and middle income country. Through ingegrating cencus, survey, satellite and GIS datasets in a flexible machine-learning framework, high resolution maps of population counts and densities for 2000-2020 are produced, along with accompanying metadata. DATASET: Alpha version 2010 and 2015 estimates of numbers of people per grid square, with national totals adjusted to match UN population division estimates and remaining unadjusted. REGION: Africa SPATIAL RESOLUTION: 0.000833333 decimal degrees (approx 100m at the equator) PROJECTION: Geographic, WGS84 UNITS: Estimated persons per grid square MAPPING APPROACH: Land cover based, as described in: Linard, C., Gilbert, M., Snow, R.W., Noor, A.M. and Tatem, A.J., 2012, Population distribution, settlement patterns and accessibility across Africa in 2010, PLoS ONE, 7(2): e31743. FORMAT: Geotiff (zipped using 7-zip (open access tool): www.7-zip.org) FILENAMES: Example - AGO10adjv4.tif = Angola (AGO) population count map for 2010 (10) adjusted to match UN national estimates (adj), version 4 (v4). Population maps are updated to new versions when improved census or other input data become available. Data and Resources