Topics
La Serena, 
Chile
473,325 people lived in La Serena in 2025. It is the 1174th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 4th largest in Chile.
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 La Serena'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 La Serena grew
For every 10 people in La Serena in 1975, there were 88.9 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 500,506 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 2000 and 2005.
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
La Serena through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in La Serena in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Chile · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 36 cities in Chile in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being Santiago. The ringed dot in colour is La Serena; 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, La Serena covered 117 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 23 km² of it. That is 48 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 7 by 7 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 9 times its size, and its people are 8.9 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 Chile
Its share of Chile
Of every 100 people in Chile in 2025, 2 lived in La Serena, which is 473,325 people.
How to read this: shrink Chile to 100 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in La Serena; 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
- 1170 Oshogbo Nigeria473,929
- 1171 Ghazipur India473,824
- 1172 Maringá Brazil473,708
- 1173 Palma de Mallorca Spain473,499
- 1174 La Serena473,325
- 1175 Raebareli India472,091
- 1176 Macapá Brazil471,922
- 1177 Piura Peru471,521
- 1178 Chuxiong China471,251
In Chile, 2025
- 58 Santiago6,726,045
- 607 Valparaíso861,145
- 1075 Concepción516,741
- 1174 La Serena473,325
- 1474 Antofagasta385,812
- 1626 Temuco352,200
- 1816 Iquique315,904
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 La Serena 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 La Serena 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