The largest urban area in the world is Guangzhou–Shenzhen, followed by Jakarta and Dhaka. 34 urban areas have more than 10 million people; the 100th largest, Dubai–Sharjah, has 4.57 million.
| # | City | Population |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Guangzhou–Shenzhen | 43.0 million |
| 2 | Jakarta | 40.5 million |
| 3 | Dhaka | 37.3 million |
| 4 | Tokyo | 33.2 million |
| 5 | Delhi | 31.4 million |
| 6 | Shanghai | 30.7 million |
| 7 | Manila | 25.9 million |
| 8 | Cairo | 25.2 million |
| 9 | Kolkata | 23.3 million |
| 10 | Seoul | 22.3 million |
| 11 | Karachi | 21.0 million |
| 12 | Mumbai | 20.5 million |
| 13 | São Paulo | 19.5 million |
| 14 | Bangkok | 19.0 million |
| 15 | Beijing | 18.2 million |
| 16 | Mexico City | 17.6 million |
| 17 | Bangalore | 15.2 million |
| 18 | Ho Chi Minh City | 14.6 million |
| 19 | Moscow | 14.4 million |
| 20 | Lahore | 14.3 million |
| 21 | Istanbul | 14.2 million |
| 22 | New York | 14.2 million |
| 23 | Buenos Aires | 14.2 million |
| 24 | Los Angeles | 13.5 million |
| 25 | Kinshasa | 12.9 million |
| 26 | Lagos | 12.8 million |
| 27 | Osaka–Kobe–Kyoto | 12.7 million |
| 28 | Luanda | 11.7 million |
| 29 | Suzhou–Wuxi | 11.5 million |
| 30 | Chennai | 11.5 million |
| 31 | Lima | 10.8 million |
| 32 | Shantou–Jieyang | 10.6 million |
| 33 | Bogotá | 10.4 million |
| 34 | London | 10.4 million |
| 35 | Rio de Janeiro | 9.85 million |
| 36 | Hajipur–Muzaffarpur region | 9.76 million |
| 37 | Taipei | 9.69 million |
| 38 | Hyderabad | 9.46 million |
| 39 | Tehran | 9.36 million |
| 40 | Paris | 9.33 million |
| 41 | Dar es Salaam | 8.92 million |
| 42 | Bandung | 8.69 million |
| 43 | Johannesburg | 8.59 million |
| 44 | Chongqing | 8.45 million |
| 45 | Kuala Lumpur | 8.41 million |
| 46 | Wuhan | 8.08 million |
| 47 | Nanjing | 8.06 million |
| 48 | Riyadh | 7.97 million |
| 49 | Ahmedabad | 7.90 million |
| 50 | Nagoya | 7.72 million |
| 51 | Kozhikode region | 7.61 million |
| 52 | Tianjin | 7.33 million |
| 53 | Addis Ababa | 7.28 million |
| 54 | Khartoum | 7.11 million |
| 55 | Surat | 7.10 million |
| 56 | Alexandria | 6.93 million |
| 57 | Baghdad | 6.89 million |
| 58 | Surabaya | 6.86 million |
| 59 | Pune | 6.67 million |
| 60 | Nairobi | 6.65 million |
| 61 | Santiago | 6.63 million |
| 62 | Abidjan | 6.45 million |
| 63 | Amman | 6.43 million |
| 64 | Hangzhou | 6.39 million |
| 65 | Luxor region | 6.31 million |
| 66 | Kabul | 6.25 million |
| 67 | Yangon | 6.19 million |
| 68 | Shenyang | 6.18 million |
| 69 | Accra | 5.89 million |
| 70 | Onitsha region | 5.79 million |
| 71 | Miami | 5.73 million |
| 72 | Madrid | 5.68 million |
| 73 | Faisalabad | 5.68 million |
| 74 | Hefei | 5.65 million |
| 75 | Chengdu | 5.61 million |
| 76 | Toronto | 5.57 million |
| 77 | Yaoundé | 5.48 million |
| 78 | Mashhad | 5.38 million |
| 79 | Chicago | 5.32 million |
| 80 | Xi'an | 5.30 million |
| 81 | Lucknow | 5.21 million |
| 82 | Kampala | 5.18 million |
| 83 | Chattogram | 5.18 million |
| 84 | Zhengzhou | 5.13 million |
| 85 | Singapore | 5.12 million |
| 86 | Kano | 5.11 million |
| 87 | Kochi region | 5.07 million |
| 88 | Hanoi | 4.97 million |
| 89 | Kumasi | 4.92 million |
| 90 | Islamabad–Rawalpindi | 4.91 million |
| 91 | Saint Petersburg | 4.88 million |
| 92 | Jeddah | 4.84 million |
| 93 | Hong Kong | 4.81 million |
| 94 | Mogadishu | 4.80 million |
| 95 | Colombo | 4.72 million |
| 96 | San Francisco–San Jose | 4.72 million |
| 97 | Santo Domingo | 4.59 million |
| 98 | Harbin | 4.59 million |
| 99 | Casablanca | 4.58 million |
| 100 | Dubai–Sharjah | 4.57 million |
Urban area = contiguous built-up land and the people living in it in 2025, drawn the same way for every city regardless of administrative boundaries. Source: GHSL Urban Centre Database R2024A, European Commission, Joint Research Centre (CC BY 4.0); some names adjusted to the city names people use, and country attribution follows the dataset.
“Region” marks urban areas that join many towns and dense rural settlement into one built-up area; they are named after their main town.
Official city limits are drawn differently in every country: some take in farmland and mountains, others stop at the historic core. Ranking cities by those limits mostly ranks boundary decisions. These lists use the built-up area instead, so a city's figure includes its suburbs wherever they are continuous with it, and nothing beyond.
For figures inside official limits, see the city-limits rankings; for the background, read how to compare city sizes honestly. Click any city to see it on a map at the same scale as another.