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Sendai, 
Japan
1,256,440 people lived in Sendai in 2025. It is the 406th largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 6th largest in Japan.
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 Sendai grew
Where Sendai had 10 people in 1975, it had 16 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 1.1 million people in 2050. It passed a million people between 1985 and 1990.
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
Sendai through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Sendai in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Japan · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Japan and its 137 cities in 2025, each a dot whose area is its number of people (the largest is Tokyo). Sendai 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, Sendai covered 299 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 83 km² of it. That is 66 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 8 by 8 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 44%, and its people have grown by 60%.
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 Japan
Its share of Japan
Of every 100 people in Japan in 2025, 1 lived in Sendai, which is 1.3 million people.
How to read this: shrink Japan to 100 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Sendai; 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
- 402 Antalya Türkiye1,273,822
- 403 Al-Najaf Iraq1,273,450
- 404 São Luís Brazil1,264,379
- 405 Herat Afghanistan1,259,425
- 406 Sendai1,256,440
- 407 Bujumbura Burundi1,246,960
- 408 Tiruppur India1,242,837
- 409 Sylhet Bangladesh1,242,548
- 410 Montevideo Uruguay1,240,244
In Japan, 2025
- 25 Osaka12,964,145
- 49 Nagoya7,146,160
- 226 Fukuoka2,225,078
- 252 Sapporo1,964,519
- 406 Sendai1,256,440
- 428 Kitakyushu1,206,731
- 435 Hiroshima1,185,788
- 484 Naha1,060,017
- 515 Nara993,952
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 Sendai 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 Sendai 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