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León, 
Mexico
1,367,521 people lived in León in 2025. It is the 371st largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 7th largest in Mexico.
That figure counts the whole built-up area, not the area León 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 León grew
For every 10 people in León in 1975, there were 31 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 1.5 million people in 2050. It passed a million people between 1995 and 2000.
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
León through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in León in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Mexico · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 186 cities in Mexico in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being Mexico City. The ringed dot in colour is León; 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, León covered 189 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 61 km² of it. That is 45 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 7 by 7 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 3.1 times its size, and its people are 3.1 times as many.
How to read this: pale is the whole of the city's land; the stronger square inside it is what is actually built on. The three are drawn to the same scale, so a larger square really is more land, and hatching means the year is the UN's projection rather than a count.
Of every 100 people in Mexico
Its share of Mexico
Of every 100 people in Mexico in 2025, 1 lived in León, which is 1.4 million people.
How to read this: 100 squares, one for every 100th person in Mexico; the coloured squares live in León. 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
- 367 Aboh Nigeria1,374,320
- 368 Abuja Nigeria1,373,722
- 369 Thrissur India1,371,675
- 370 Fort Lauderdale United States1,368,027
- 371 León1,367,521
- 372 Xining China1,360,245
- 373 Fez Morocco1,359,989
- 374 Vijayawada India1,351,098
- 375 Huaiyin District China1,349,827
In Mexico, 2025
- 116 Monterrey3,938,015
- 255 Puebla1,947,971
- 320 Tijuana1,557,695
- 335 Toluca1,505,035
- 371 León1,367,521
- 417 Torreón1,227,850
- 425 Ciudad Juárez1,212,370
- 517 San Luis Potosí992,648
- 590 Querétaro880,361
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 León 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 León 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