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Linfen, 
China
945,174 people lived in Linfen in 2025. It is the 553rd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 82nd 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 Linfen grew
For every 10 people in Linfen in 1980, there were 121.1 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 818,122 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 1990 and 1995. 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
Linfen through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Linfen in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
China · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 2,082 cities in China in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being Shanghai. The ringed dot in colour is Linfen; 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, Linfen covered 152 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 31 km² of it. That is 33 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 6 by 6 metres. Since 1980, its built-up land has grown to 3.6 times its size, and its people are 12.1 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 China
Its share of China
Of every 1,000 people in China in 2025, 1 lived in Linfen, which is 945,174 people.
How to read this: shrink China to 1,000 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Linfen; 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
- 549 Trujillo Peru949,018
- 550 Bukavu Democratic Republic of the Congo948,948
- 551 Krishnanagar India948,788
- 552 Namangan Uzbekistan947,465
- 553 Linfen945,174
- 554 Homs Syria940,460
- 555 Bucaramanga Colombia939,291
- 556 Samarqand Uzbekistan932,219
- 557 Banjarmasin Indonesia930,711
In China, 2025
- 531 Guilin973,970
- 534 Baoding970,162
- 536 Xiangyang969,011
- 537 Fushan968,359
- 553 Linfen945,174
- 558 Ma'anshan929,836
- 564 Xuchang916,553
- 568 Weifang908,584
- 580 Qiqihar892,744
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 Linfen 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 Linfen 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