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Laiwu, 
China
379,135 people lived in Laiwu in 2025. It is the 1499th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 279th largest in China.
This is the UN's built-up area, drawn from satellite pictures and census maps rather than from the city limits, and the two can be a long way apart. The rule behind it.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Laiwu grew
Where Laiwu had 10 people in 1975, it had 29.4 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 320,419 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 1990 and 1995.
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
Laiwu through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Laiwu in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
China · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: China and its 2,082 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Shanghai). Laiwu 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, Laiwu covered 114 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 29 km² of it. That is 76 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 9 by 9 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 5.2 times its size, and its people are 2.9 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 China
Its share of China
Fewer than 1 in every 1,000 people in China lived in Laiwu in 2025 — about 1 in 3,704.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 1495 Mbale City Uganda380,565
- 1496 KUNDULUN Nigeria380,118
- 1497 Al-Asafra Egypt379,559
- 1498 Cumana Venezuela379,333
- 1499 Laiwu379,135
- 1500 Lop Buri Thailand378,160
- 1501 Bengkulu Indonesia378,066
- 1502 Tripoli Lebanon377,937
- 1503 Kralpora India377,602
In China, 2025
- 1482 Tongling383,739
- 1488 Guangyuan381,738
- 1490 Changji/Sanji381,391
- 1494 Dongyang380,793
- 1499 Laiwu379,135
- 1511 Xinghua375,876
- 1519 Haimen374,644
- 1536 Liuyang371,661
- 1538 Taizhou371,055
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 Laiwu 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 Laiwu 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