Topics
Xichang, 
China
309,170 people lived in Xichang in 2025. It is the 1862nd largest of the world's 12,138 cities, and the 343rd largest in China.
Like every city on this site, Xichang is counted as a built-up area seen from above rather than as a city government's territory. Why that changes the number.
Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries
People · every five years · 1975 to 2050
How Xichang grew
Count 10 people in Xichang in 1975 and the same count gives 18.9 in 2025.
On the UN's projection it will have 295,473 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
Xichang through your family’s years
Put in the years your family were born. You’ll see how many people lived in Xichang in each of those years, and when each of them turned 30.
China · every city · 2025
Where it is
How to read this: every dot is one of the 2,082 cities in China in 2025, and a dot's area is how many people live there, the biggest being Shanghai. The ringed dot in colour is Xichang; 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, Xichang covered 53 km², and buildings, roads and other built-up land covered 9.6 km² of it. That is 31 m² of built-up land for each person, about a square 6 by 6 metres. Since 1975, its built-up land has grown to 6.4 times its size, and its people have grown by 89%.
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 China
Its share of China
Fewer than 1 in every 1,000 people in China lived in Xichang in 2025 — about 1 in 4,545.
Ranked by people · 2025
Cities of a similar size
In the world, 2025
- 1858 Huairou309,856
- 1859 Kindu Democratic Republic of the Congo309,727
- 1860 Sandwip Bangladesh309,439
- 1861 Moshi Tanzania309,202
- 1862 Xichang309,170
- 1863 Madhepura India309,065
- 1864 Nagasaki Japan308,986
- 1865 Cangnan308,925
- 1866 Qoqand Uzbekistan308,393
In China, 2025
- 1829 Raoping313,705
- 1835 Lufeng312,588
- 1853 Emeishan310,503
- 1858 Huairou309,856
- 1862 Xichang309,170
- 1865 Cangnan308,925
- 1868 Tonghua308,016
- 1872 Jinshan307,246
- 1879 Cenxi306,146
How to read this: the figure in front of a name is where that city stands among the 12,138 cities the UN counted in 2025, and each bar is its people, on one scale per list. Numbers are missing where a city has fewer than 300,000 people and so has no page of its own.
Apparatus
Sources and method
The figures for Xichang 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 Xichang 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