Topics
Ife, 
Nigeria
492,000 people lived in Ife in 2025. It is the 1131st largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 39th largest in Nigeria.
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 Ife'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 Ife grew
For every 10 people in Ife in 1980, there were 58.3 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 695,944 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 2000 and 2005. The UN first counts it as a city in 1980, when it passed 50,000 people.
projected (after 2025) · how sure the UN is: high moderate low
How to read this: one column every five years, 1975 to 2050; its height is the number of people. Hatched columns are the UN's projection. The thin strip beneath says how sure the UN is of each figure: the stronger the colour, the surer. A blank means the place was not on the UN's list of cities that year.
People · your family's years · 1975 to 2050
Ife through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Ife in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Nigeria · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 457 cities in Nigeria in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being Lagos. The ringed dot in colour is Ife; 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, Ife covered 92 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 26 km² of it. That is 53 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 7 by 7 metres. Since 1980, its built-up land has grown to 4 times its size, and its people are 5.8 times 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 Nigeria
Its share of Nigeria
Of every 1,000 people in Nigeria in 2025, 2 lived in Ife, which is 492,000 people.
How to read this: 1,000 squares stand for everyone in Nigeria, one square for every 1,000th person. Count the coloured ones and you have Ife's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 1127 Aswan Egypt493,753
- 1128 Hardoi India493,665
- 1129 Dezhou China493,272
- 1130 Bulawayo Zimbabwe492,771
- 1131 Ife492,000
- 1132 Al-Kut Iraq491,247
- 1133 Cusco Peru490,968
- 1134 Quebec Canada490,451
- 1135 Kakinada India488,958
In Nigeria, 2025
- 939 Madalla583,367
- 972 Ondo564,330
- 1076 Minna516,451
- 1105 Ijebu-Ode500,036
- 1131 Ife492,000
- 1167 Gusau475,004
- 1170 Oshogbo473,929
- 1235 Ilesa450,464
- 1248 Ogbomosho445,090
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 Ife are the UN's own, at five-year steps: an estimate for each of 1980 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 Ife 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