Mogadishu in Somalia led the ranking of cities with the highest population density in 2025, with ****** residents per square kilometer. When it comes to countries, Monaco is the most densely populated state worldwide.

The Global Population Density Grid Time Series Estimates provide a back-cast time series of population density grids based on the year 2000 population grid from SEDAC's Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project, Version 1 (GRUMPv1) data set. The grids were created by using rates of population change between decades from the coarser resolution History Database of the Global Environment (HYDE) database to back-cast the GRUMPv1 population density grids. Mismatches between the spatial extent of the HYDE calculated rates and GRUMPv1 population data were resolved via infilling rate cells based on a focal mean of values. Finally, the grids were adjusted so that the population totals for each country equaled the UN World Population Prospects (2008 Revision) estimates for that country for the respective year (1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000). These data do not represent census observations for the years prior to 2000, and therefore can at best be thought of as estimations of the populations in given locations. The population grids are consistent internally within the time series, but are not recommended for use in creating longer time series with any other population grids, including GRUMPv1, Gridded Population of the World, Version 4 (GPWv4), or non-SEDAC developed population grids. These population grids served as an input to SEDAC's Global Estimated Net Migration Grids by Decade: 1970-2000 data set. To provide back-cast population density estimates at 30 arc-second (~1 km) resolution.

CONTENT

This is a list of cities worldwide by population density. The population, population density and land area for the cities listed are based on the entire city proper, the defined boundary or border of a city or the city limits of the city. The population density of the cities listed is based on the average number of people living per square kilometer or per square mile. This list does not refer to the population, population density or land area of the greater metropolitan area or urban area, nor particular districts in any of the cities listed.

As of 2025, Tokyo-Yokohama in Japan was the largest world urban agglomeration, with 37 million people living there. Delhi ranked second with more than 34 million, with Shanghai in third with more than 30 million inhabitants.

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.

Population of Urban Agglomerations with 300,000 Inhabitants or more in 2014, by city, 1950-2030 (thousands). Data for 1,692 cities contained in the Excel file. Note: Each country has its own definition of what is 'urban' and therefore use exercise caution when comparing cities in different countries. Data available from the United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2014). World Urbanization Prospects: The 2014 Revision, CD-ROM Edition. Further detail of population estimates, land area, and population density for world urban areas with over 500,000 people (924 areas) is available with Demographia's World Urban Areas report (2014). Much of this data is based on the UN urban agglomerations, though a range of other sources are also used.

The Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project, Version 1 (GRUMPv1): Population Density Grid estimates population per square km for the years 1990, 1995, and 2000 by 30 arc-second (1km) grid cells and associated data sets dated circa 2000. A proportional allocation gridding algorithm, utilizing more than 1,000,000 national and sub-national geographic Units, is used to assign population values to grid cells. The population count grids are divided by the land area grid to produce population density grids. This data set is produced by the Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) in collaboration with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), The World Bank, and Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT).

The Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project, Version 1 (GRUMPv1): Population Density Grid estimates population per square km for the years 1990, 1995, and 2000 by 30 arc-second (1km) grid cells and associated data sets dated circa 2000. A proportional allocation gridding algorithm, utilizing more than 1,000,000 national and sub-national geographic Units, is used to assign population values to grid cells. The population count grids are divided by the land area grid to produce population density grids. This data set is produced by the Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) in collaboration with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), The World Bank, and Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT).

🌍 Ultimate Geographic Data Collection | Cities & Zip Codes

📌 Overview

Welcome to the Ultimate Geographic Data Collection, a comprehensive dataset providing valuable geographic insights. This dataset includes U.S. Zip Codes, U.S. Cities, and World Cities data, making it an essential resource for developers, data analysts, and researchers. Whether you're building location-based applications, conducting geographic analysis, or working on machine learning projects, this dataset offers an extensive and curated collection of location-based information.

📊 What's Inside?

• U.S. Zip Codes Database (Free Version) 🏙️

  • Includes ZIP codes, state associations, and geographic coordinates.
  • 🔗 Usage Condition: Requires a visible backlink to SimpleMaps US Zip Code Database.

• U.S. Cities Database (Free Version) 🌆

  • Includes city names, state information, latitude, longitude, and population data.
  • 🔗 Usage Condition: Requires a visible backlink to SimpleMaps US Cities Database.

• Basic World Cities Database 🗺️

  • Provides global city data licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0.
  • 📜 Learn more: CC BY 4.0 License.

• Comprehensive & Pro World Cities Database (Density Data) 🌎

  • Population density estimates sourced from CIESIN - Columbia University.
  • 🔗 Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 with no additional restrictions.

⚖️ License & Usage Terms

• ✅ You CAN:

  • Use this dataset in private and public-facing applications.
  • Create copies and backups for your projects.
  • Transfer the license (with provider approval via email).

• 🚫 You CANNOT:

  • Redistribute the dataset publicly without written permission.
  • Use it in a way that violates any laws.
  • Bypass the backlink requirement (for free U.S. Zip Code & Cities Databases).

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1. Download the dataset 📥.
2. Ensure compliance with licensing terms.
3. Use it in your projects for analysis, visualization, or machine learning.
4. Provide attribution (if applicable) for free datasets.

⚠️ Disclaimer

• This dataset is provided "AS IS", without any warranties.
• The provider is not liable for any issues arising from usage.
• Users are responsible for ensuring legal compliance in their jurisdiction.

🔥 Get Started!

Enhance your geographic projects with this powerful dataset today! 🚀

📩 For any inquiries, licensing requests, or attribution clarifications, contact the dataset provider.

The Global Grid of Probabilities of Urban Expansion to 2030 presents spatially explicit probabilistic forecasts of global urban land cover change from 2000 to 2030 at a 2.5 arc-minute resolution. For each grid cell that is non-urban in 2000, a Monte-Carlo model assigned a probability of becoming urban by the year 2030. The authors first extracted urban extent circa 2000 from the NASA MODIS Land Cover Type Product Version 5, which provides a conservative estimate of global urban land cover. The authors then used population densities from the Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project, Version 1 (GRUMPv1) to create the population density driver map. They estimated the amount of new urban land in each United Nations region by 2030 in a Monte-Carlo fashion based on present empirical distribution of regional urban population densities and probability density functions of projected regional population and GDP values for 2030. To facilitate integration with other data products, CIESIN reprojected the data from Goode's Homolosine to Geographic WGS84 projection.

The Low Elevation Coastal Zone (LECZ) Urban-Rural Population and Land Area Estimates, Version 2 data set consists of country-level estimates of urban population, rural population, total population and land area country-wide and in LECZs for years 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2100. The LECZs were derived from Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM), 3 arc-second (~90m) data which were post processed by ISciences LLC to include only elevations less than 20m contiguous to coastlines; and to supplement SRTM data in northern and southern latitudes. The population and land area statistics presented herein are summarized at the low coastal elevations of less than or equal to 1m, 3m, 5m, 7m, 9m, 10m, 12m, and 20m. Additionally, estimates are provided for elevations greater than 20m, and nationally. The spatial coverage of this data set includes 202 of the 232 countries and statistical areas delineated in the Gridded Rural-Urban Mapping Project version 1 (GRUMPv1) data set. The 30 omitted areas were not included because they were landlocked, or otherwise lacked coastal features. This data set makes use of the population inputs of GRUMPv1 allocated at 3 arc-seconds to match the SRTM elevations, and at 30 arc-seconds resolution in order to reflect uncertainty levels in the product resulting from the interplay of input population data resolutions (based on census units) and the elevation data. Urban and rural areas are differentiated by the GRUMPv1 Urban Extents. This data set is produced by the Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN). To provide estimates of urban and rural populations and land areas for the years 1990, 2000, and 2010; and projections to the year 2100 for 202 countries with contiguous coastal elevations in the following categories: less than or equal to 1m, 3m, 5m, 7m, 9m, 10m, 12m, or 20m; as well as national totals.

Vietnam Population Density: SE: Ho Chi Minh city data was reported at 4,513.100 Person/sq km in 2023. This records an increase from the previous number of 4,481.000 Person/sq km for 2022. Vietnam Population Density: SE: Ho Chi Minh city data is updated yearly, averaging 4,196.400 Person/sq km from Dec 2011 (Median) to 2023, with 13 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 4,513.100 Person/sq km in 2023 and a record low of 3,633.100 Person/sq km in 2011. Vietnam Population Density: SE: Ho Chi Minh city data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by General Statistics Office. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Vietnam – Table VN.G003: Population Density: By Provinces.

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.

Global Urban Area Indicators

Population Density, Rent & Real Estate Prices, Transport Times & Land Use

By [source]

About this dataset

This dataset contains comprehensive information on population densities, rental and real estate prices, transport times and land uses from around the world. It provides an in-depth range of cities, allowing for a comprehensive snapshot of worldwide urban development. Use this data to uncover how regional differences in population, infrastructure and regional designations can affect mobility patterns as well as economic and environmental issues linked to city life. Gridded key indicators including public transport, private cars and much more are included for analysis purposes within a fully reproducible workflow system. This data is an invaluable asset for understanding the complexities of global urban areas from both social and ecological perspectives

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How to use the dataset

This dataset provides a comprehensive comparison of population density, rent and real estate prices, transport times and land use across 192 different cities around the world. As such, it offers a valuable resource for studying the effects of urban area development on aspects such as mobility and living patterns around the world. In this guide we'll provide an overview of how to use this data set to best gain insight.

• Get familiar with the structure of the data: The dataset contains more than 200 columns divided among four main categories: population density, rent/real estate prices, transport time & information and land use information from government sources and survey reports. All columns are clearly labeled meaning that it's easy to quickly identify which column contains what kind of information
• Identify important variables for your particular study topic: Depending upon your particular goal or research question you may want to focus on certain columns or categories more than others in order to reveal patterns between areas or locations within cities or regions
• Analyze existing correlations between variables & locations: Once you're familiar with all available data then you can start analyzing existing correlations - either visualizing them as maps or charts in multiple software packages like Tableau or R - by joining above mentioned data set with location coordinates (latitude/longitude) provided in the global urban indicators dataset

Research Ideas

• Analyzing the correlation between real estate prices, transport times and land use in urban areas to make decisions about how to improve city infrastructure.
• Examining the impact of different external factors on population densities, such as transportation links and natural preservation policies.
• Comparing urban development indicators across different cities around the world to better understand global trends in urbanization

Acknowledgements

If you use this dataset in your research, please credit the original authors. Data Source

License

License: CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) - Public Domain Dedication No Copyright - You can copy, modify, distribute and perform the work, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission. See Other Information.

Columns

File: TransportData.csv | Column name | Description | |:--------------------|:---------------------------------------------------------------| | X | X coordinate of the city. (Numeric) | | Y | Y coordinate of the city. (Numeric) | | Area | Area of the city. (Numeric) | | City | Name of the city. (String) | | Country | Country of the city. (String) | | Continent | Continent of the city. (String) | | dCenter | Distance to the city center. (Numeric) | | TransportSource | Source of the transport data. (String) | | RushHour | Whether the transport data is from rush hour or not. (Boolean) | | TransportYear | Year of the transport data. (Numeric) | | DistanceDriving | Driving distance. (Numeric) ...

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?

This service is available to all ArcGIS Online users with organizational accounts. For more information on this service, including the terms of use, visit us at http://goto.arcgisonline.com/landscape7/World_Population_Density_Estimate_2016.This layer is a global estimate of human population density for 2016. The advantage population density affords over raw counts is the ability to compare levels of persons per square kilometer anywhere in the world. Esri calculated density by converting the the World Population Estimate 2016 layer to polygons, then added an attribute for geodesic area, which allowed density to be derived, and that was converted back to raster. A population density raster is better to use for mapping and visualization than a raster of raw population counts because raster cells are square and do not account for area. For instance, compare a cell with 185 people in northern Quito, Ecuador, on the equator to a cell with 185 people in Edmonton, Canada at 53.5 degrees north latitude. This is difficult because the area of the cell in Edmonton is only 35.5% of the area of a cell in Quito. The cell in Edmonton represents a density of 9,810 persons per square kilometer, while the cell in Quito only represents a density of 3,485 persons per square kilometer. Dataset SummaryEach cell in this layer has an integer value with the estimated number of people per square kilometer likely to live in the geographic region represented by that cell. Esri additionally produced several additional layers: World Population Estimate 2016: this layer contains estimates of the count of people living within the the area represented by the cell. World Population Estimate Confidence 2016: the confidence level (1-5) per cell for the probability of people being located and estimated correctly. World Settlement Score 2016: the dasymetric likelihood surface used to create this layer by apportioning population from census polygons to the settlement score raster.To use this layer in analysis, there are several properties or geoprocessing environment settings that should be used:Coordinate system: WGS_1984. This service and its underlying data are WGS_1984. We do this because projecting population count data actually will change the populations due to resampling and either collapsing or splitting cells to fit into another coordinate system. Cell Size: 0.0013474728 degrees (approximately 150-meters) at the equator. No Data: -1Bit Depth: 32-bit signedThis layer has query, identify, pixel, and export image functions enabled, and is restricted to a maximum analysis size of 30,000 x 30,000 pixels - an area about the size of Africa.What can you do with this layer?This layer is primarily intended for cartography and visualization, but may also be useful for analysis, particularly for estimating where people living above specified densities. There are two processing templates defined for this layer: the default, "World Population Estimated 2016 Density Classes" uses a classification, described above, to show locations of levels of rural and urban populations, and should be used for cartography and visualization; and "None," which provides access to the unclassified density values, and should be used for analysis. The breaks for the classes are at the following levels of persons per square kilometer:100 - Rural (3.2% [0.7%] of all people live at this density or lower) 400 - Settled (13.3% [4.1%] of all people live at this density or lower)1,908 - Urban (59.4% [81.1%] of all people live at this density or higher)16,978 - Heavy Urban (13.0% [24.2%] of all people live at this density or higher)26,331 - Extreme Urban (7.8% [15.4%] of all people live at this density or higher) Values over 50,000 are likely to be erroneous due to spatial inaccuracies in source boundary dataNote the above class breaks were derived from Esri's 2015 estimate, which have been maintained for the sake of comparison. The 2015 percentages are in gray brackets []. The differences are mostly due to improvements in the model and source data. While improvements in the source data will continue, it is hoped the 2017 estimate will produce percentages that shift less.For analysis, Esri recommends using the Zonal Statistics tool or the Zonal Statistics to Table tool where you provide input zones as either polygons, or raster data, and the tool will summarize the average, highest, or lowest density within those zones.

The Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project, Version 1 (GRUMPv1) consists of estimates of human population for the years 1990, 1995, and 2000 by 30 arc-second (1km) grid cells and associated data sets dated circa 2000. A proportional allocation gridding algorithm, utilizing more than 1,000,000 national and sub-national geographic units, is used to assign population values (counts, in persons) to grid cells. This data set is produced by the Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) in collaboration with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), The World Bank, and Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT).

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.

GPWv4 is a gridded data product that depicts global population data from the 2010 round of Population and Housing Censuses. The Population Density, 2015 layer represents persons per square kilometer for year 2015. Data Summary:GPWv4 is constructed from national or subnational input areal units of varying resolutions. The native grid cell size is 30 arc-seconds, or ~1 km at the equator. Separate grids are available for population count, population density, estimated land area, and data quality indicators; which include the water mask represented in this service. Population estimates are derived by extrapolating the raw census counts to estimates for the 2010 target year. The development of GPWv4 builds upon previous versions of the data set (Tobler et al., 1997; Deichmann et al., 2001; Balk et al., 2006).The full GPWv4 data collection will consist of population estimates for the years 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020, and will include grids for estimates of total population, age, sex, and urban/rural status. However, this release consists only of total population estimates for the year 2015. This data is being released now to allow users access to the population grids.Recommended Citation:Center for International Earth Science Information Network - CIESIN - Columbia University. 2016. Gridded Population of the World, Version 4 (GPWv4): Population Density. Palisades, NY: NASA Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC). http://dx.doi.org/10.7927/H4NP22DQ. Accessed DAY MONTH YEAR

This statistic shows the top 25 cities in the United States with the highest resident population as of July 1, 2022. There were about 8.34 million people living in New York City as of July 2022.