Topics
Milan, 
Italy
2,599,022 people lived in Milan in 2025. It is the 194th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 2nd largest in Italy.
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 Milan grew
Milan had about as many people in 2025 as in 1975.
On the UN's projection it will have 2.5 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
Milan through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Milan in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Italy · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Milan is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of Italy in 2025, 95 in all, led by Naples, 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, Milan covered 492 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 134 km² of it. That is 51 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 7 by 7 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 32%, and its people are about 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 Italy
Its share of Italy
Of every 100 people in Italy in 2025, 4 lived in Milan, which is 2.6 million people.
How to read this: 100 squares stand for everyone in Italy, one square for every 100th person. Count the coloured ones and you have Milan's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 190 Tel Aviv Israel2,642,872
- 191 Birmingham United Kingdom2,631,757
- 192 Kiev Ukraine2,614,581
- 193 Wuxi China2,613,100
- 194 Milan2,599,022
- 195 Caracas Venezuela2,576,666
- 196 Manchester United Kingdom2,535,427
- 197 Quito Ecuador2,534,914
- 198 Cotonou Benin2,506,489
In Italy, 2025
- 181 Naples2,767,923
- 194 Milan2,599,022
- 207 Rome2,376,474
- 447 Turin1,150,975
- 812 Palermo667,442
- 1042 Genoa532,509
- 1229 Catania453,376
- 1253 Bologna443,849
- 1298 Florence430,806
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 Milan 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 Milan 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