Topics
Busan, 
South Korea
3,263,221 people lived in Busan in 2025. It is the 146th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 2nd largest in South Korea.
This is the UN's built-up area, drawn from satellite pictures and census maps rather than from the city limits, and the two can be a long way apart. The rule behind it.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Busan grew
Where Busan had 10 people in 1975, it had 13.5 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 2.7 million people in 2050.
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
Busan through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Busan in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
South Korea · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Busan is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of South Korea in 2025, 49 in all, led by Seoul, each drawn with an area that matches its people. Countries next door are outlines only.
Area and built-up land · km²
How much land it covers
In 2025, Busan covered 361 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 71 km² of it. That is 22 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 5 by 5 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 45%, and its people have grown by 35%.
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 South Korea
Its share of South Korea
Of every 100 people in South Korea in 2025, 6 lived in Busan, which is 3.3 million people.
How to read this: shrink South Korea to 100 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Busan; 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
- 142 Nanchang China3,299,773
- 143 Nanning China3,288,636
- 144 Quanzhou China3,286,129
- 145 Washington, D.C. United States3,270,018
- 146 Busan3,263,221
- 147 Nagpur India3,257,841
- 148 Algiers Algeria3,246,400
- 149 Fortaleza Brazil3,244,260
- 150 Kathmandu Nepal3,231,516
In South Korea, 2025
- 10 Seoul22,490,482
- 146 Busan3,263,221
- 213 Daegu2,334,446
- 331 Daejeon1,517,299
- 351 Gwangju1,441,495
- 588 Ulsan881,858
- 780 Cheongju-si690,333
- 814 Changwon665,772
- 848 Jeonju637,082
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 Busan 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 Busan 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