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Santiago de Cuba, 
Cuba
429,537 people lived in Santiago de Cuba in 2025. It is the 1303rd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 2nd largest in Cuba.
Like every city on this site, Santiago de Cuba 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 Santiago de Cuba grew
Where Santiago de Cuba had 10 people in 1975, it had 13.9 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 373,199 people in 2050.
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
Santiago de Cuba through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Santiago de Cuba in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Cuba · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Santiago de Cuba is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of Cuba in 2025, 28 in all, led by Havana, 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, Santiago de Cuba covered 43 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 10 km² of it. That is 24 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 5 by 5 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 46%, and its people have grown by 39%.
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 Cuba
Its share of Cuba
Of every 100 people in Cuba in 2025, 4 lived in Santiago de Cuba, which is 429,537 people.
How to read this: shrink Cuba to 100 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Santiago de Cuba; 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
- 1299 Kisumu Kenya430,532
- 1300 Katihar India430,470
- 1301 Chandpur Bangladesh430,144
- 1302 Providence United States429,694
- 1303 Santiago de Cuba429,537
- 1304 Cheonan-si South Korea428,378
- 1305 Huidong China428,137
- 1306 Samadon Egypt428,126
- 1307 Khansahib India428,041
In Cuba, 2025
How to read this: names are in order of size, the leading number being each city's rank among all 12,138 in 2025; the bars share a scale within a list. A jump in the ranks means a city under 300,000 people, which is not given a page here.
Apparatus
Sources and method
The figures for Santiago de Cuba 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 Santiago de Cuba 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