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Atbara, 
Sudan
232,808 people lived in Atbara in 2025. It is the 2523rd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 20th largest in Sudan.
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 Atbara'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 Atbara grew
Where Atbara had 10 people in 1975, it had 37.7 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 443,996 people in 2050. On the UN's projection it passes 250,000 people between 2025 and 2030.
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
Atbara through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Atbara in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Sudan · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Sudan and its 105 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Khartoum). Atbara 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, Atbara covered 49 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 11 km² of it. That is 49 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 7 by 7 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 2.1 times its size, and its people are 3.8 times as many.
How to read this: each pale square is the city's whole area, the strong square inside it the part that is built on; one scale for all three, so a bigger square is more land. Hatched is the UN's projection.
Of every 100 people in Sudan
Its share of Sudan
Of every 1,000 people in Sudan in 2025, 5 lived in Atbara, which is 232,808 people.
How to read this: shrink Sudan to 1,000 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Atbara; the grey ones are everybody else, in other cities, in towns and out in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 2513 El Geneina233,696
- 2515 Chakan India233,615
- 2517 Kasama Zambia233,587
- 2519 Limbe Cameroon233,212
- 2523 Atbara232,808
- 2526 Mutuati Kenya232,440
- 2527 Nakhon Pathom Thailand232,416
- 2528 Bosaso Somalia232,410
- 2529 Biliri Nigeria232,398
In Sudan, 2025
- 2300 Rabak253,166
- 2308 Shendi252,344
- 2459 Derudeib238,164
- 2513 El Geneina233,696
- 2523 Atbara232,808
- 2869 Mellit207,693
- 3212 Ed Al Fursan188,089
- 3355 Sinkāt180,082
- 3846 ad-Damer157,497
How to read this: names are in order of size, the leading number being each city's rank among all 12,138 in 2025; the bars share a scale within a list. A jump in the ranks means a city under 300,000 people, which is not given a page here.
Apparatus
Sources and method
The figures for Atbara 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 Atbara 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