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Raqqa, 
Syria
237,106 people lived in Raqqa in 2025. It is the 2471st largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 8th largest in Syria.
Like every city on this site, Raqqa 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 Raqqa grew
Count 10 people in Raqqa in 1975 and the same count gives 46.2 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 305,953 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 2005 and 2010.
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
Raqqa through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Raqqa in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Syria · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Raqqa is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of Syria in 2025, 37 in all, led by Damascus, 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, Raqqa covered 34 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 11 km² of it. That is 46 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 7 by 7 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 93%, and its people are 4.6 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 Syria
Its share of Syria
Of every 1,000 people in Syria in 2025, 9 lived in Raqqa, which is 237,106 people.
How to read this: 1,000 squares, one for every 1,000th person in Syria; the coloured squares live in Raqqa. 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
- 2464 Tal Afar Iraq237,454
- 2465 Dhaka India237,385
- 2469 Manikganj Bangladesh237,163
- 2470 Lakhnaur India237,133
- 2471 Raqqa237,106
- 2472 Bonsa Bota Ethiopia237,061
- 2478 Fomboni Comoros236,750
- 2479 Ha'il Saudi Arabia236,744
- 2482 Modanganj India236,293
In Syria, 2025
- 920 Latakia591,300
- 1520 Hama374,643
- 2010 Qamishli289,200
- 2246 Deir Ez Zor259,771
- 2471 Raqqa237,106
- 2494 Al-Hasakah235,085
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.
Apparatus
Sources and method
The figures for Raqqa 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 Raqqa 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