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Cities · Bosnia and Herzegovina · capital
Sarajevo, 
Bosnia and Herzegovina
253,857 people lived in Sarajevo in 2025. It is the 2295th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the largest in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where it is the capital.
That figure counts the whole built-up area, not the area Sarajevo governs, so it may be far from the number the city publishes about itself. How the UN measures a city.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Sarajevo grew
Where Sarajevo had 10 people in 1975, it had 6.9 in 2025, fewer than it started with.
On the UN's projection it will have 226,959 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
Sarajevo through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Sarajevo in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Bosnia and Herzegovina · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 4 cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there. The ringed dot in colour is Sarajevo; the grey dots are the rest. The outlines around them are neighbouring countries.
Area and built-up land · km²
How much land it covers
In 2025, Sarajevo covered 72 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 14 km² of it. That is 55 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 7 by 7 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 61%, and its people have fallen by 31%.
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 Bosnia and Herzegovina
Its share of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Of every 100 people in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2025, 8 lived in Sarajevo, which is 253,857 people.
How to read this: shrink Bosnia and Herzegovina to 100 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Sarajevo; 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
- 2289 Arkhangelsk Russia254,797
- 2290 Shakar Garh Pakistan254,655
- 2293 Gaborone Botswana254,517
- 2294 Pathein Myanmar253,953
- 2295 Sarajevo253,857
- 2299 Borigaon India253,566
- 2300 Rabak Sudan253,166
- 2302 Hadejia Nigeria252,778
- 2303 Azare Nigeria252,755
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 Sarajevo 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 Sarajevo 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