Wakayama, Japan

Count 10 people in Wakayama in 1975 and the same count gives 6.2 in 2025 — the city lost people.

On the UN's projection it will have 191,342 people in 2050. The UN's figures for Wakayama fall from 409,977 in 1975 to 191,342 in 2050. The UN rates its own confidence in the 1975 figure as high: cities are counted from census maps, and where those are old or coarse the figures are least certain.

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.

How to read this: every dot is one of the 137 cities in Japan in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being Tokyo. The ringed dot in colour is Wakayama; the grey dots are the rest. The outlines around them are neighbouring countries.

In 2025, Wakayama covered 93 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 25 km² of it. That is 97 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 10 by 10 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown by 28%, and its people have fallen by 38%.

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 1,000 people in Japan in 2025, 2 lived in Wakayama, which is 255,782 people.

How to read this: shrink Japan to 1,000 people and this is what you get. The coloured squares are the ones who would live in Wakayama; the grey ones are everybody else, in other cities, in towns and out in the country.

In the world, 2025

1. 2278 Ogu Nigeria256,345
2. 2279 Kilwa Democratic Republic of the Congo256,165
3. 2280 Abat Nigeria256,126
4. 2281 Centurion South Africa255,900
5. 2282 Wakayama255,782
6. 2283 Punto Fijo Venezuela255,662
7. 2288 Skikda Algeria255,379
8. 2289 Arkhangelsk Russia254,797
9. 2290 Shakar Garh Pakistan254,655

In Japan, 2025

1. 2061 Hamamatsu282,084
2. 2073 Kofu280,212
3. 2152 Nagano270,476
4. 2229 Hakodate261,557
5. 2282 Wakayama255,782
6. 2460 Ota237,865
7. 5014 Fujieda122,203

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.

Japan · All the world's cities

The figures for Wakayama 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 Wakayama 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