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Medan, 
Indonesia
4,245,895 people lived in Medan in 2025. It is the 102nd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 4th largest in Indonesia.
Like every city on this site, Medan is counted as a built-up area seen from above rather than as a city government's territory. Why that changes the number.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Medan grew
Count 10 people in Medan in 1975 and the same count gives 25 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 4.1 million people in 2050.
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
Medan through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Medan in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Indonesia · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Medan is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of Indonesia in 2025, 389 in all, led by Jakarta, 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, Medan covered 603 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 135 km² of it. That is 32 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 6 by 6 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 68%, and its people are 2.5 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 Indonesia
Its share of Indonesia
Of every 100 people in Indonesia in 2025, 1 lived in Medan, which is 4.2 million people.
How to read this: 100 squares, one for every 100th person in Indonesia; the coloured squares live in Medan. 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
- 98 Kumasi Ghana4,297,984
- 99 Damascus Syria4,287,746
- 100 Jeddah Saudi Arabia4,284,080
- 101 Kuwait City Kuwait4,265,132
- 102 Medan4,245,895
- 103 Bamako Mali4,244,881
- 104 Luxor Egypt4,188,023
- 105 Belo Horizonte Brazil4,162,814
- 106 Wenzhou China4,158,195
In Indonesia, 2025
- 1 Jakarta41,913,860
- 40 Bandung8,909,104
- 54 Surabaya6,843,503
- 102 Medan4,245,895
- 177 Tasikmalaya2,827,255
- 179 Yogyakarta2,793,747
- 186 Semarang2,679,349
- 209 Denpasar2,352,734
- 223 Makassar2,255,088
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 Medan 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 Medan 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