Topics
Hanover, 
Germany
611,288 people lived in Hanover in 2025. It is the 887th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 13th largest in Germany.
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 Hanover'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 Hanover grew
Hanover had about as many people in 2025 as in 1975.
On the UN's projection it will have 563,986 people in 2050.
projected (after 2025) · how sure the UN is: high moderate low
How to read this: each column is one of the UN's five-yearly estimates, 1975 through 2050, and taller means more people. Where a column is hatched the year has not happened yet. The strip under the columns is the UN's own confidence in each figure, palest where it is least sure; where it is blank the city was not on the list at all.
People · your family's years · 1975 to 2050
Hanover through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Hanover in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Germany · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 100 cities in Germany in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being Berlin. The ringed dot in colour is Hanover; 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, Hanover covered 182 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 41 km² of it. That is 68 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 8 by 8 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 41%, and its people are about as many.
How to read this: the outer pale square stands for all the land the city covers, and the solid square inside it for the part with buildings, roads and the like on it. All three squares share a scale, so you can compare them by eye. A hatched one is a year the UN has projected.
Of every 100 people in Germany
Its share of Germany
Of every 1,000 people in Germany in 2025, 7 lived in Hanover, which is 611,288 people.
How to read this: 1,000 squares, one for every 1,000th person in Germany; the coloured squares live in Hanover. The grey rest live in other cities, in towns or in the countryside.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 883 Uberlândia Brazil613,434
- 884 Bissau Guinea-Bissau612,643
- 885 Rajmahal India612,055
- 886 Al Ismailiya Egypt612,046
- 887 Hanover611,288
- 888 Cipanas Indonesia610,177
- 889 Xingning China609,923
- 890 Kasur Pakistan609,468
- 891 Sfax Tunisia608,293
In Germany, 2025
- 708 Bonn756,044
- 717 Dortmund748,106
- 820 Wuppertal662,663
- 837 Nuremberg644,169
- 887 Hanover611,288
- 989 Dresden554,612
- 1017 Leipzig542,313
- 1241 Mannheim448,203
- 1309 Wiesbaden427,270
How to read this: the number before each name is its place among all 12,138 cities in the world in 2025; bars are people, on one scale per list. Only cities that reach 300,000 people have a page here, so a gap in the numbers is a smaller city.
Apparatus
Sources and method
The figures for Hanover 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 Hanover 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