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Hargeisa, 
Somalia
1,593,542 people lived in Hargeisa in 2025. It is the 310th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 2nd largest in Somalia.
Like every city on this site, Hargeisa is counted as a built-up area seen from above rather than as a city government's territory. Why that changes the number.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Hargeisa grew
Count 10 people in Hargeisa in 1975 and the same count gives 62.8 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 2.5 million people in 2050. It passed a million people between 2015 and 2020.
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
Hargeisa through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Hargeisa in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Somalia · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Somalia and its 53 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Mogadishu). Hargeisa 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, Hargeisa covered 95 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 22 km² of it. That is 13 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 4 by 4 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 3.4 times its size, and its people are 6.3 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 Somalia
Its share of Somalia
Of every 100 people in Somalia in 2025, 8 lived in Hargeisa, which is 1.6 million people.
How to read this: 100 squares, one for every 100th person in Somalia; the coloured squares live in Hargeisa. 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
- 306 Tegucigalpa Honduras1,607,033
- 307 Maharajganj India1,601,258
- 308 Ulaanbaatar Mongolia1,596,556
- 309 Havana Cuba1,593,580
- 310 Hargeisa1,593,542
- 311 Ta'izz Yemen1,586,739
- 312 Erbil Iraq1,582,829
- 313 Jabalpur India1,582,131
- 314 Rajkot India1,581,235
In Somalia, 2025
- 95 Mogadishu4,399,430
- 310 Hargeisa1,593,542
- 1207 Kismayo461,302
- 1310 Burao427,013
- 1339 Baidoa420,281
- 1571 Borama363,753
- 1823 Wanlaweyn314,824
- 1915 Merca299,906
- 1992 Beledweyne291,630
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 Hargeisa 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 Hargeisa 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