Topics
Van, 
Türkiye
590,314 people lived in Van in 2025. It is the 922nd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 17th largest in Türkiye.
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 Van grew
Where Van had 10 people in 1975, it had 64.7 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 594,505 people in 2050. It passed 250,000 people between 1995 and 2000.
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
Van through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Van in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
Türkiye · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: Van is the dot in colour with a ring around it. The grey dots are the other cities of Türkiye in 2025, 177 in all, led by Istanbul, 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, Van covered 64 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 13 km² of it. That is 22 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 5 by 5 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 8.5 times its size, and its people are 6.5 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 Türkiye
Its share of Türkiye
Of every 1,000 people in Türkiye in 2025, 7 lived in Van, which is 590,314 people.
How to read this: shrink Türkiye to 1,000 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Van; 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
- 918 Samsun594,089
- 919 Adana593,872
- 920 Latakia Syria591,300
- 921 Yongchuan China590,694
- 922 Van590,314
- 923 Darjeeling India590,052
- 924 Brahmapur India590,028
- 925 Weihai China589,850
- 926 Benguela Angola589,289
In Türkiye, 2025
- 729 Kocaeli737,380
- 825 Diyarbakir660,826
- 918 Samsun594,089
- 919 Adana593,872
- 922 Van590,314
- 970 Kahramanmaraş565,732
- 977 Denizli561,327
- 1047 Hatay530,262
- 1092 Malatya506,854
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 Van 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 Van 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