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Bamako, 
Mali
4,244,881 people lived in Bamako in 2025. It is the 103rd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the largest in Mali, where it is the capital.
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 Bamako'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 Bamako grew
For every 10 people in Bamako in 1975, there were 123.5 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 7.6 million people in 2050. On the UN's projection it passes five million people between 2030 and 2035.
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
Bamako through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Bamako in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Mali · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Mali and its 20 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people. Bamako 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, Bamako covered 506 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 145 km² of it. That is 34 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 6 by 6 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 3.6 times its size, and its people are 12.3 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 Mali
Its share of Mali
Of every 100 people in Mali in 2025, 17 lived in Bamako, which is 4.2 million people.
How to read this: 100 squares stand for everyone in Mali, one square for every 100th person. Count the coloured ones and you have Bamako's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 99 Damascus Syria4,287,746
- 100 Jeddah Saudi Arabia4,284,080
- 101 Kuwait City Kuwait4,265,132
- 102 Medan Indonesia4,245,895
- 103 Bamako4,244,881
- 104 Luxor Egypt4,188,023
- 105 Belo Horizonte Brazil4,162,814
- 106 Wenzhou China4,158,195
- 107 Sydney Australia4,150,917
In Mali, 2025
- 103 Bamako4,244,881
- 1461 Sikasso389,804
- 1962 Ségou295,589
- 2050 Koutiala283,496
- 2083 Kayes278,727
- 3607 Gao167,417
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 Bamako 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 Bamako 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