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Sheffield, 
United Kingdom
549,695 people lived in Sheffield in 2025. It is the 1001st largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 10th largest in the United Kingdom.
That figure counts the whole built-up area, not the area Sheffield 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 Sheffield grew
Count 10 people in Sheffield in 1975 and the same count gives 12.5 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 583,953 people in 2050.
projected (after 2025) · how sure the UN is: high moderate low
How to read this: one column every five years, 1975 to 2050; its height is the number of people. Hatched columns are the UN's projection. The thin strip beneath says how sure the UN is of each figure: the stronger the colour, the surer. A blank means the place was not on the UN's list of cities that year.
People · your family's years · 1975 to 2050
Sheffield through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Sheffield in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
United Kingdom · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 150 cities in the United Kingdom in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being London. The ringed dot in colour is Sheffield; 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, Sheffield covered 153 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 36 km² of it. That is 65 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 8 by 8 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 49%, 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 100 people in the United Kingdom
Its share of the United Kingdom
Of every 1,000 people in the United Kingdom in 2025, 8 lived in Sheffield, which is 549,695 people.
How to read this: 1,000 squares stand for everyone in the United Kingdom, one square for every 1,000th person. Count the coloured ones and you have Sheffield's share; the grey remainder live somewhere else in the country.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 997 Luhe China551,106
- 998 Boumerdes Algeria550,700
- 999 Bahraich India550,317
- 1000 Riga Latvia550,267
- 1001 Sheffield549,695
- 1002 Purwakarta Indonesia549,480
- 1003 Kikwit Democratic Republic of the Congo549,102
- 1004 Port Louis Mauritius549,015
- 1005 Arrah India547,584
In the United Kingdom, 2025
- 533 Glasgow970,320
- 700 Newcastle upon Tyne760,969
- 835 Nottingham649,610
- 875 Bristol615,703
- 1001 Sheffield549,695
- 1046 Leicester530,264
- 1058 Edinburgh521,784
- 1137 Portsmouth488,385
- 1188 Brighton467,937
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 Sheffield 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 Sheffield 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