Luiza, Democratic Republic of the Congo

Count 10 people in Luiza in 2005 and the same count gives 25.5 in 2025.

On the UN's projection it will have 300,407 people in 2050. On the UN's projection it passes 250,000 people between 2040 and 2045. The UN first counts it as a city in 2005, when it passed 50,000 people.

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.

How to read this: Luiza is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2025, 223 in all, led by Kinshasa, each drawn with an area that matches its people. Countries next door are outlines only.

In 2025, Luiza covered 14 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 2.4 km² of it. That is 18 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 4 by 4 metres. Since 2005, its built-up land has grown by 85%, and its people are 2.6 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 1,000 people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2025, 1 lived in Luiza, which is 135,439 people.

How to read this: shrink the Democratic Republic of the Congo to 1,000 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Luiza; the grey ones are everybody else, in other cities, in towns and out in the country.

In the world, 2025

1. 4384 Kurgan Russia139,073
2. 4389 Rubuchi Nigeria138,912
3. 4404 Khayran Yemen138,244
4. 4439 Lwebo137,354
5. 4501 Luiza135,439
6. 4522 Okposi Nigeria134,677
7. 4537 Marawi Philippines134,181
8. 4542 `Adan Barakah Yemen134,066
9. 4554 Chilanga Zambia133,860

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 2025

1. 3825 Musumba158,159
2. 4052 Tshimbulu149,595
3. 4117 Mukanga147,526
4. 4439 Lwebo137,354
5. 4501 Luiza135,439
6. 5978 Busisi103,613
7. 6672 Kipese92,786
8. 8652 Walungu71,897
9. 9376 Loutu66,056

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.

Democratic Republic of the Congo · All the world's cities

The figures for Luiza are the UN's own, at five-year steps: an estimate for each of 2005 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 Luiza 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