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Aleppo, 
Syria
2,922,277 people lived in Aleppo in 2025. It is the 168th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 2nd largest in Syria.
The UN measures every city in the world the same way, by where the buildings are rather than where the boundary runs, so this figure and Aleppo's own can differ widely. What counts as a city here.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Aleppo grew
For every 10 people in Aleppo in 1975, there were 45.7 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 4.3 million people in 2050. It passed a million people between 1985 and 1990.
projected (after 2025) · how sure the UN is: high moderate low
How to read this: read it left to right, 1975 to 2050, one column every five years, the height being people. Hatching marks the projected years. Below, a strip of the UN's confidence: strong colour where the census maps are recent and detailed, pale where they are not, blank where the place was not counted as a city.
People · your family's years · 1975 to 2050
Aleppo through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Aleppo in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Syria · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Syria and its 37 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Damascus). Aleppo is ringed, in colour; the other cities are grey. Neighbouring countries are outlines.
Area and built-up land · km²
How much land it covers
In 2025, Aleppo covered 262 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 59 km² of it. That is 20 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 4 by 4 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 2.9 times its size, and its people are 4.6 times as many.
How to read this: pale is the whole of the city's land; the stronger square inside it is what is actually built on. The three are drawn to the same scale, so a larger square really is more land, and hatching means the year is the UN's projection rather than a count.
Of every 100 people in Syria
Its share of Syria
Of every 100 people in Syria in 2025, 11 lived in Aleppo, which is 2.9 million people.
How to read this: 100 squares stand for everyone in Syria, one square for every 100th person. Count the coloured ones and you have Aleppo's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 164 Shijiazhuang China2,990,397
- 165 Multan Pakistan2,956,642
- 166 Thiruvananthapuram India2,946,119
- 167 Asansol India2,924,741
- 168 Aleppo2,922,277
- 169 Brahmanbaria Bangladesh2,914,727
- 170 Miami United States2,912,486
- 171 Fuzhou China2,910,985
- 172 Pyongyang North Korea2,901,588
In Syria, 2025
- 99 Damascus4,287,746
- 168 Aleppo2,922,277
- 554 Homs940,460
- 920 Latakia591,300
- 1520 Hama374,643
- 2010 Qamishli289,200
- 2246 Deir Ez Zor259,771
- 2471 Raqqa237,106
- 2494 Al-Hasakah235,085
How to read this: the figure in front of a name is where that city stands among the 12,138 cities the UN counted in 2025, and each bar is its people, on one scale per list. Numbers are missing where a city has fewer than 300,000 people and so has no page of its own.
Apparatus
Sources and method
The figures for Aleppo are the UN's own, at five-year steps: an estimate for each of 1975 to 2025, then projection to 2050. Projected years are drawn hatched, and the UN publishes no range of uncertainty for a city. What a city means here, how the UN measures one, and why that number can differ from the one Aleppo publishes about itself: how the figures here are put together.
Sources: UN WUP 2025 · Natural Earth · flag-icons. Every source, its licence and how to cite it →
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries