List of largest cities throughout history facts for kids

This article is about the biggest human settlements in the world throughout history. A human settlement is simply a place where people live, like a village, town, or city.

We'll look at how the largest settlements grew, from small "proto-cities" (very early cities) with just 1,000-2,000 people around 7000 BC, to huge "metropolitan areas" like Tokyo with 26 million people by the year 2000.

Some historians think cities like Rome, Chang'an (in China), or Baghdad (in Iraq) might have been the first to reach 1 million people. This could have happened as early as the 1st century AD or as late as the 8th century AD. Other cities that might have reached 1 million include Luoyang, Kaifeng, Hangzhou, Jinling, Beijing (all in China), and Edo (in Japan).

Most experts agree that London was the first city to reach 2 million people. And New York was the first to reach 10 million.

Today, the Greater Tokyo Area in Japan has been the world's largest metropolitan area since 1955. In 2020, it had over 37.393 million residents! However, Jakarta (in Indonesia) might become the largest by 2030, partly because Tokyo's population is slowly shrinking.

It's important to know that numbers for cities before the 1800s are often guesses. It's really hard to know exactly how many people lived in ancient cities because they didn't have official censuses (headcounts) like we do today. That's why different historians might have slightly different numbers.

The Biggest Cities Through Time

This table shows the largest human settlements at different times in history. The numbers are estimates from three historians: Ian Morris, George Modelski, and Tertius Chandler.

When you see a city name in bold, it means all three historians agree that it was the largest at that time. You can see how the biggest places changed from early "proto-cities" to full "cities," then to "urban areas" (cities and their close surroundings), and finally to huge "metropolitan areas" (even wider areas including suburbs).

See also

• Historical urban community sizes, 7000 BC – 1875
• List of largest European cities in history
• List of largest cities, present day
• Estimates of historical world population
• Valeriepieris circle