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Lu'an, 
China
729,998 people lived in Lu'an in 2025. It is the 734th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 120th 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 Lu'an grew
Count 10 people in Lu'an in 1975 and the same count gives 26.2 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 601,545 people in 2050.
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
Lu'an through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Lu'an in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
China · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Lu'an is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of China in 2025, 2,082 in all, led by Shanghai, 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, Lu'an covered 97 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 19 km² of it. That is 26 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 5 by 5 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 5.5 times its size, and its people are 2.6 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
Of every 1,000 people in China in 2025, 1 lived in Lu'an, which is 729,998 people.
How to read this: 1,000 squares stand for everyone in China, one square for every 1,000th person. Count the coloured ones and you have Lu'an's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 730 Benxi734,933
- 731 Nellore India732,235
- 732 Columbus United States731,335
- 733 Sahiwal Pakistan730,463
- 734 Lu'an729,998
- 735 Tulungagung Indonesia728,924
- 736 Balikpapan Indonesia728,771
- 737 Zhumadian727,923
- 738 Al Ahsa Saudi Arabia725,760
In China, 2025
- 714 Jiaxing751,156
- 718 Yichun745,754
- 725 Dandong738,721
- 730 Benxi734,933
- 734 Lu'an729,998
- 737 Zhumadian727,923
- 739 Suqian725,070
- 744 Yingxia719,432
- 745 Gulin718,364
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 Lu'an 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 Lu'an 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