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Pontianak, 
Indonesia
808,759 people lived in Pontianak in 2025. It is the 655th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 26th largest in Indonesia.
Like every city on this site, Pontianak 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 Pontianak grew
Count 10 people in Pontianak in 1975 and the same count gives 30.3 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 864,920 people in 2050.
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
Pontianak through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Pontianak in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Indonesia · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Pontianak 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, Pontianak covered 151 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 32 km² of it. That is 40 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 6 by 6 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 3 times its size, and its people are 3 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 1,000 people in Indonesia in 2025, 3 lived in Pontianak, which is 808,759 people.
How to read this: 1,000 squares, one for every 1,000th person in Indonesia; the coloured squares live in Pontianak. 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
- 651 Barquisimeto Venezuela812,384
- 652 Quzhou China811,735
- 653 Detroit United States809,894
- 654 Goma Democratic Republic of the Congo809,601
- 655 Pontianak808,759
- 656 Udaipur India807,617
- 657 Jining China803,706
- 658 Andijon Uzbekistan803,518
- 659 Abeokuta Nigeria801,826
In Indonesia, 2025
- 514 Mataram997,132
- 525 Jambi980,534
- 528 Pekalongan978,519
- 557 Banjarmasin930,711
- 655 Pontianak808,759
- 735 Tulungagung728,924
- 736 Balikpapan728,771
- 751 Jepara714,514
- 810 Kudus671,940
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 Pontianak 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 Pontianak 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