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.

It is estimated that the cities of Cordova (modern-day Córdoba) and Palermo were the largest cities in Europe in 1050, and had between fifteen and twenty times the population of most other entries in this graph, Despite this the cities of Cordova (the capital city of the Umayyad caliphate, who controlled much of the Iberian peninsula from the seventh to eleventh centuries), and Palermo (another Arab-controlled capital in Southern Europe) were still the only cities in Western Europe with a population over one hundred thousand people, closely followed by Seville. It is also noteworthy to point out that the five largest cities on this list were importing trading cities, in modern day Spain or Italy, although the largest cities become more northern and western European in later lists (1200, 1330, 1500, 1650 and 1800). In 1050, todays largest Western European cities, London and Paris, had just twenty-five and twenty thousand inhabitants respectively.

The period of European history (and much of world history) between 500 and 1500 is today known as the 'Dark Ages'. Although the term 'Dark Ages' was originally applied to the lack of literature and arts, it has since been applied to the lack or scarcity of recorded information from this time. Because of these limitations, much information about this time is still being debated today.

In 1500, the largest city was Paris, with an estimated 225 thousand inhabitants, almost double the population of the second-largest city, Naples. As in 1330, Venice and Milan remain the third and fourth largest cities in Western Europe, however Genoa's population almost halved from 1330 until 1500, as it was struck heavily by the bubonic plague in the mid-1300s. In lists prior to this, the largest cities were generally in Spain and Italy, however, as time progressed, the largest populations could be found more often in Italy and France. The year 1500 is around the beginning of what we now consider modern history, a time that saw the birth of many European empires and inter-continental globalization.

The largest Western European city in 1200 was Palermo, with 150 thousand inhabitants. This is a great decrease in the number 150 years previously, where the population was 350 thousand. The city of Cordova also decreased by almost 400 thousand in this time, possibly because of the declining Arabian control and influence in the area. Seville is the third largest city on this list, although it's overall population decreased by ten thousand since 1050. The largest cities are generally in Spain or Italy, although the second largest city on this list is Paris, with 110 thousand inhabitants. In the lists that follow, Paris remains at the top as either the largest (1500 and 1650) or second largest (1330 and 1800) city in Western Europe.

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.

Between 1500 and 1800, London grew to be the largest city in Western Europe, with its population growing almost 22 times larger in this period. London would eventually overtake Constantinople as Europe's largest in the 1700s, before becoming the largest city in the world (ahead of Beijing) in the early-1800s.

The most populous cities in this period were the capitals of European empires, with Paris, Amsterdam, and Vienna growing to become the largest cities, alongside the likes of Lisbon and Madrid in Iberia, and Naples or Venice in Italy. Many of northwestern Europe's largest cities in 1500 would eventually be overtaken by others not shown here, such as the port cities of Hamburg, Marseilles or Rotterdam, or more industrial cities such as Berlin, Birmingham, and Munich.

Population in the largest city (% of urban population) in European Union was reported at 15.95 % in 2023, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources. European Union - Population in the largest city - actual values, historical data, forecasts and projections were sourced from the World Bank on March of 2025.

It is estimated that the largest cities in Western Europe in 1330 were Paris and Granada. At this time, Paris was the seat of power in northern France, while Granada had become the largest multicultural city in southern Spain, controlled by the Muslim, Nasrid Kingdom during Spain's Reconquista period. The next three largest cities were Venice, Genoa and Milan, all in northern Italy, renowned as important trading cities during the middle ages. In October 1347, the first wave of the Black Death had arrived in Sicily and then began spreading throughout Europe, decimating the population.

All cities with a population > 1000 or seats of adm div (ca 80.000)Sources and ContributionsSources : GeoNames is aggregating over hundred different data sources. Ambassadors : GeoNames Ambassadors help in many countries. Wiki : A wiki allows to view the data and quickly fix error and add missing places. Donations and Sponsoring : Costs for running GeoNames are covered by donations and sponsoring.Enrichment:add country name

ESA, in collaboration with European Space Imaging, has collected this WorldView-2 dataset covering the most populated areas in Europe at 40 cm resolution. The products have been acquired between July 2010 and July 2015. Spatial coverage: Check the spatial coverage of the collection on a map available on the Third Party Missions Dissemination Service.

Paris was Western Europe's largest city in 1650, with an estimated 400 thousand inhabitants, which is almost double it's population 150 years previously. In second place is London, with 350 thousand inhabitants, however it has grown by a substantially higher rate than Paris during this time, now seven times larger than it was in the year 1500. Naples remains in the top three largest cities, growing from 125 to 300 thousand inhabitants during this time. In the previous list, the Italian cities of Milan and Venice were the only other cities with more than one hundred thousand inhabitants, however in this list they have been joined by the trading centers of Lisbon and Amsterdam, the capital cities of the emerging Portuguese and Dutch maritime empires.

Urban population refers to people living in urban areas as defined by national statistical offices. It is calculated using World Bank population estimates and urban ratios from the United Nations World Urbanization Prospects. Aggregation of urban and rural population may not add up to total population because of different country coverages.

In 2023, the population of the United Kingdom was around 68.3 million, with approximately 34.5 million women and 33.1 million men. Since 1953, the male population of the UK has grown by around 9.1 million, while the female population has increased by approximately 8.5 million. Throughout this provided time period, the female population of the UK has consistently outnumbered the male population. UK population one of the largest in Europe As of 2022, the population of the United Kingdom was the largest it has ever been, and with growth expected to continue, the forecasted population of the United Kingdom is expected to reach over 70 million by the 2030s. Despite the relatively small size of its territory, the UK has one of the largest populations among European countries, slightly larger than France but smaller than Russia and Germany. As of 2022, the population density of the UK was approximately 279 people per square kilometer, with London by far the most densely populated area, and Scotland the most sparsely populated. Dominance of London As seen in the data regarding population density, the population of the United Kingdom is not evenly distributed across the country. Within England, London has a population of almost nine million, making it significantly bigger than the next largest cities of Birmingham and Manchester. As of 2022, Scotland's largest city, Glasgow had a population of around 1.7 million, with the largest cities in Northern Ireland, and Wales being Belfast and Cardiff, which had populations of 643,000 and 488,000 respectively.

London and Munich were among the most expensive cities in Europe for the construction of warehouses in 2024, while advanced manufacturing facilities were the most expensive in Amsterdam. Meanwhile, among the selected cities, Paris had the lowest construction costs for warehouses. However, construction costs do not always follow the same trends as commercial real estate in Europe, with sale prices differing significantly in some cases. Warehouse take-up in Europe These high construction costs in the largest cities probably affect the take-up of large warehouses European cities. Instead, Birmingham in the United Kingdom (UK) came in first in 2023, with roughly 913,000 square meters of warehouse space spread throughout the municipality. Of the first ten entries, two werelocated in the UK, which makes it one of the most popular warehouse locations. Retail warehouse rental prices London was the UK region with the highest bix-box warehouse rent prices. As of the last quarter of 2023, roughly 28.5 British pounds were paid per square foot. This was more than twice the amount paid for the same type of buildings in the West Midlands. London was also the European city with the highest rent for warehouses, with Oslo and Helsinki following far behind.

Germany, the UK, and France had the largest commercial real estate markets in Europe in 2024, amounting to almost half of the European market. The market size is based on the value of high-quality real estate as a percentage of each country’s GDP. In Germany, the market size of commercial real estate was about 1.9 trillion U.S. dollars.  Investment in commercial real estate Although the United Kingdom had a smaller market size than Germany, it recorded a higher commercial real estate investment volume in 2023. Due to the unfavorable economic climate, transaction activity declined markedly that year, affecting the whole region. Many countries, such as Germany, Sweden, and Italy, saw investment plummet by approximately 50 percent. Most popular European cities among real estate investors Industry experts consider a broad range of factors when allocating capital to real estate assets. Transport connectivity and a city’s economic performance, however, stood out as most important, according to a 2023 survey. Unsurprisingly, the capital cities of the UK, Spain, and France ranked as the European cities with the highest real estate prospects in 2025.

In 2024, Russia had the largest population among European countries at 144.8 million people. The next largest countries in terms of their population size were Turkey at 87.5 million, Germany at 84.5 million, the United Kingdom at 69.1 million, and France at 66.5 million. Europe is also home to some of the world’s smallest countries, such as the microstates of Liechtenstein and San Marino, with populations of 39,870 and 33,581 respectively. Europe’s largest economies Germany was Europe’s largest economy in 2023, with a Gross Domestic Product of around 4.2 trillion Euros, while the UK and France are the second and third largest economies, at 3.2 trillion and 2.8 trillion euros respectively. Prior to the mid-2000s, Europe’s fourth-largest economy, Italy, had an economy that was of a similar sized to France and the UK, before diverging growth patterns saw the UK and France become far larger economies than Italy. Moscow and Istanbul the megacities of Europe Two cities on the eastern borders of Europe were Europe’s largest in 2023. The Turkish city of Istanbul, with a population of 15.8 million, and the Russian capital, Moscow, with a population of 12.7 million. Istanbul is arguably the world’s most famous transcontinental city with territory in both Europe and Asia and has been an important center for commerce and culture for over two thousand years. Paris was the third largest European city with a population of 11 million, with London being the fourth largest at 9.6 million.

Costs of coastal flooding and protection are essential information for risk assessment and natural hazards research, but there are few systematic attempts to quantify cost curves beyond the case study level. Here, we present a set of systematically derived damage and protection cost curves for the 600 largest (by area) European coastal cities. The city clusters were identified by an automated cluster algorithm from CORINE land cover 2012 data, following the Urban Morphological Zone (UMZ) definition.The data provides detailed cost curves for direct flood damages at flood heights between 0 and 12 m on a 0.5 m increment. Costs estimates are based on depth damage functions for different land use obtained from the European Joint Research Center. The necessary mapping between land use and land cover is based on Land Use/Cover Area frame Survey (LUCAS) 2015 primary data. The underlying inundation maps were derived from the European Digital Elevation Model (EU-DEM).Furthermore, the data contain curves for the cost of protection at the same heights and increments as the damage curves, assuming no previously installed protection. These curves are available both for a low and high cost scenario and are based on hypothetical protection courses derived from cluster data and inundation maps.All cost estimates are given in Euro and were inflation-adjusted to 2016 price levels. For spatial reference, we include the individual raster tiles depicting the extent of each city cluster.The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Community's Seventh Framework Programme under Grant Agreement No. 308497 (Project RAMSES). Supplement to: Prahl, Boris F; Boettle, Markus; Costa, Luis; Kropp, Jürgen P; Rybski, Diego (2018): Damage and protection cost curves for coastal floods within the 600 largest European cities. Scientific Data, 5(1), 180034

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.

Milan had the highest average PM2.5 concentration among Europe's most populated cities in 2021 and 2022, with 19.7 µg/m3. Milan sits in the Po Valley of Northern Italy, which is one of Europe's most polluted regions due to its geographical location and proximity to industrial activities. Poland's capital Warsaw ranked second, with average PM2.5 concentrations of 16.1 µg/m3 based on levels measured in 2021 and 2022. Warsaw is prone to poor air quality due to factors such as burning solid fuels for household heating. Around 97 percent of the European Union's urban population is exposed to PM2.5 concentrations above World Health Organization guidelines.

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.