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Bhopal, 
India
2,487,205 people lived in Bhopal in 2025. It is the 199th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 26th largest in India.
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 Bhopal'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 Bhopal grew
Where Bhopal had 10 people in 1975, it had 48.7 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 2.9 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
Bhopal through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Bhopal in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
India · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 2,054 cities in India in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being New Delhi. The ringed dot in colour is Bhopal; the grey dots are the rest. The outlines around them are neighbouring countries.
Area and built-up land · km²
How much land it covers
In 2025, Bhopal covered 236 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 52 km² of it. That is 21 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 5 by 5 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 4.8 times its size, and its people are 4.9 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 India
Its share of India
Of every 1,000 people in India in 2025, 2 lived in Bhopal, which is 2.5 million people.
How to read this: 1,000 squares stand for everyone in India, one square for every 1,000th person. Count the coloured ones and you have Bhopal's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 195 Caracas Venezuela2,576,666
- 196 Manchester United Kingdom2,535,427
- 197 Quito Ecuador2,534,914
- 198 Cotonou Benin2,506,489
- 199 Bhopal2,487,205
- 200 Curitiba Brazil2,475,352
- 201 Tunis Tunisia2,473,428
- 202 Dighwara2,469,443
- 203 Chandigarh2,437,733
In India, 2025
- 166 Thiruvananthapuram2,946,119
- 167 Asansol2,924,741
- 173 Tamluk2,894,484
- 180 Agra2,786,762
- 199 Bhopal2,487,205
- 202 Dighwara2,469,443
- 203 Chandigarh2,437,733
- 205 Ponnani2,409,567
- 206 Coimbatore2,382,988
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 Bhopal 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 Bhopal 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