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Kollam, 
India
3,074,562 people lived in Kollam in 2025. It is the 162nd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 21st largest in India.
That figure counts the whole built-up area, not the area Kollam governs, so it may be far from the number the city publishes about itself. How the UN measures a city.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Kollam grew
Count 10 people in Kollam in 1975 and the same count gives 78.1 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 3.6 million people in 2050. It passed a million people between 1990 and 1995.
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
Kollam through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Kollam in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
India · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Kollam is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of India in 2025, 2,054 in all, led by New Delhi, 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, Kollam covered 695 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 74 km² of it. That is 24 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 5 by 5 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 6 times its size, and its people are 7.8 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 Kollam, which is 3.1 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 Kollam's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 158 Salvador Brazil3,135,157
- 159 Gujranwala Pakistan3,121,271
- 160 Athens Greece3,101,979
- 161 Ningbo China3,094,833
- 162 Kollam3,074,562
- 163 Cebu City Philippines3,044,564
- 164 Shijiazhuang China2,990,397
- 165 Multan Pakistan2,956,642
- 166 Thiruvananthapuram2,946,119
In India, 2025
- 136 Indore3,476,423
- 141 Patna3,309,383
- 147 Nagpur3,257,841
- 156 Kalyan-Dombivli3,163,424
- 162 Kollam3,074,562
- 166 Thiruvananthapuram2,946,119
- 167 Asansol2,924,741
- 173 Tamluk2,894,484
- 180 Agra2,786,762
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 Kollam 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 Kollam 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