Rubaya, Democratic Republic of the Congo

Where Rubaya had 10 people in 2000, it had 32.8 in 2025.

On the UN's projection it will have 442,083 people in 2050. On the UN's projection it passes 250,000 people between 2030 and 2035. The UN first counts it as a city in 2000, 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.

How to read this: the Democratic Republic of the Congo and its 223 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Kinshasa). Rubaya is ringed, in colour; the other cities are grey. Neighbouring countries are outlines.

In 2025, Rubaya covered 20 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 2.0 km² of it. That is 11 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 3 by 3 metres. Since 2020, its built-up land has grown to 2 times its size, and its people have grown by 25%.

How to read this: pale is the whole of the city's land; the stronger square inside it is what is actually built on. The three are drawn to the same scale, so a larger square really is more land, and hatching means the year is the UN's projection rather than a count.

Of every 1,000 people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2025, 2 lived in Rubaya, which is 189,880 people.

How to read this: 1,000 squares, one for every 1,000th person in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; the coloured squares live in Rubaya. The grey rest live in other cities, in towns or in the countryside.

In the world, 2025

1. 3153 Toraghundi Afghanistan190,543
2. 3154 Mokolo Cameroon190,418
3. 3161 Nabire Indonesia190,211
4. 3164 Ibrat Uzbekistan189,898
5. 3166 Rubaya189,880
6. 3167 Ago-Iwoye Nigeria189,841
7. 3169 Abu Gharaq Iraq189,692
8. 3187 Mathbarer Char Bangladesh188,871
9. 3190 Ar Rijad Yemen188,715

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 2025

1. 3036 Dilolo197,075
2. 3057 Kisantu195,949
3. 3094 Kinzao193,973
4. 3127 Nyunzu192,205
5. 3166 Rubaya189,880
6. 3418 Lwambo176,648
7. 3459 Kitenge174,943
8. 3593 Mukubu168,033
9. 3659 Sandoa165,522

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.

Democratic Republic of the Congo · All the world's cities

The figures for Rubaya are the UN's own, at five-year steps: an estimate for each of 2000 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 Rubaya 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