Topics
Merca, 
Somalia
299,906 people lived in Merca in 2025. It is the 1915th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 8th largest in Somalia.
The UN measures every city in the world the same way, by where the buildings are rather than where the boundary runs, so this figure and Merca's own can differ widely. What counts as a city here.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Merca grew
Count 10 people in Merca in 1980 and the same count gives 56.4 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 587,941 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 2020 and 2025. 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: each column is one of the UN's five-yearly estimates, 1975 through 2050, and taller means more people. Where a column is hatched the year has not happened yet. The strip under the columns is the UN's own confidence in each figure, palest where it is least sure; where it is blank the city was not on the list at all.
People · your family's years · 1975 to 2050
Merca through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Merca in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Somalia · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Somalia and its 53 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Mogadishu). Merca is ringed, in colour; the other cities are grey. Neighbouring countries are outlines.
Area and built-up land · km²
How much land it covers
In 2025, Merca covered 10 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 1.5 km² of it. That is 5 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 2 by 2 metres. Since 1995, its built-up land has grown by 50%, and its people are 3.2 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 Somalia
Its share of Somalia
Of every 100 people in Somalia in 2025, 2 lived in Merca, which is 299,906 people.
How to read this: shrink Somalia to 100 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Merca; 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
- 1911 Szczecin Poland300,314
- 1912 Biskra Algeria300,313
- 1913 Orizaba Mexico300,041
- 1914 Lublin Poland300,013
- 1915 Merca299,906
- 1916 Caruaru Brazil299,805
- 1917 Menongue Angola299,802
- 1918 Anantnag India299,385
- 1919 Bukittinggi Indonesia299,353
In Somalia, 2025
- 1310 Burao427,013
- 1339 Baidoa420,281
- 1571 Borama363,753
- 1823 Wanlaweyn314,824
- 1915 Merca299,906
- 1992 Beledweyne291,630
- 2273 Jowhar257,210
- 2528 Bosaso232,410
- 3241 Balcad186,328
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 Merca 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 Merca 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