Topics
Sanhur, 
Egypt
412,618 people lived in Sanhur in 2025. It is the 1364th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 29th largest in Egypt.
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 Sanhur grew
For every 10 people in Sanhur in 1990, there were 81.4 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 681,736 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 2010 and 2015. The UN first counts it as a city in 1990, when it passed 50,000 people.
projected (after 2025) · how sure the UN is: high moderate low
How to read this: read it left to right, 1975 to 2050, one column every five years, the height being people. Hatching marks the projected years. Below, a strip of the UN's confidence: strong colour where the census maps are recent and detailed, pale where they are not, blank where the place was not counted as a city.
People · your family's years · 1975 to 2050
Sanhur through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Sanhur in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Egypt · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Egypt and its 219 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Cairo). Sanhur 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, Sanhur covered 73 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 8.1 km² of it. That is 20 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 4 by 4 metres. Since 1990, its built-up land has grown to 7.4 times its size, and its people are 8.1 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 Egypt
Its share of Egypt
Of every 1,000 people in Egypt in 2025, 3 lived in Sanhur, which is 412,618 people.
How to read this: shrink Egypt to 1,000 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Sanhur; 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
- 1360 Charsadda Pakistan413,686
- 1361 Port Moresby Papua New Guinea413,223
- 1362 Hathras India413,122
- 1363 Ciudad del Este Paraguay412,725
- 1364 Sanhur412,618
- 1365 Kaolack Senegal412,347
- 1366 Jixi China412,341
- 1367 Hamhung North Korea412,277
- 1368 Americana Brazil412,133
In Egypt, 2025
- 1214 Al Abbasa al Sharqiya457,678
- 1268 Maragha440,011
- 1306 Samadon428,126
- 1353 Kafr Al Sheikh415,494
- 1364 Sanhur412,618
- 1405 Minya Al-Qamh402,716
- 1410 Mallawi401,471
- 1431 Mit Habib397,104
- 1466 Birimbal al Quadima389,333
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 Sanhur are the UN's own, at five-year steps: an estimate for each of 1990 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 Sanhur 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