List of urban areas in the European Union

This is a list of urban areas in the European Union with over 500,000 inhabitants as of 2014. This list is an attempt to present a consistent list of population figures for urban areas in the European Union. Figures here have been compiled by Eurostat, Demographia and the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs.^[1][2][3] Demographia provides figures for urban areas (including conurbations),^[2] while the UN DESA figures are for agglomerations only.^[3]

Important notes

• This is a list of urban areas, not a list of metropolitan areas. Urban areas are contiguous built-up areas where houses are typically not more than 200 m apart (discounting rivers, parks, roads, industrial fields, etc.). A metropolitan area is an urban area plus the satellite cities around the urban area and the agricultural land in between. For instance London is sometimes listed with 14 million inhabitants, Stuttgart is frequently listed with 2.2 million inhabitants, Munich with 2 million or more, etc., indicating the wider metropolitan area of those places. Metropolitan areas, which imply much more complicated definitions (such as the proportion of people in satellite cities working in the core of the metropolitan area), can be accurately computed only by statistical offices, after they have chosen a definition for metropolitan areas, whereas urban areas can be computed by any institution or person with the study of maps, satellite imagery and other geographical data in order to determine the outer limits of a continuous built-up area with one or more neighbouring cities. Furthermore, the list does not make a difference between cities that have multiple satellites and cities that do not. Therefore, two cities with the same demographics for their urban area will have an equal ranking on this list, even if one of the two cities may be much larger as it is the core of a number of satellites.
• This is a list of urban areas, not a list of administrative cities. For example, the list of conurbations contains the urban area of Lille-Kortrijk. Lille and Kortrijk remain two very distinct cities, each belonging to a different country, culture and language area. For a list of the largest cities of the European Union by population, please see Largest cities of the European Union by population within city limits.
• The study of urban areas is useful to analyse how cities develop, which in turn can be used to define transportation, planning and environmental policies, to adjust administrative boundaries etc. At the same time its limitations have to be acknowledged. It is a purely geographic study and disregards all other factors that contribute to the analysis of the functional city. For instance, several cities in the European Union such as Brussels and London have reserved green belts in the outskirts which impacts the size of urban areas but not the "perceived city" as these green belts have now become integrated in what people consider to be the functional city.

Urban areas over 500,000 inhabitants (2015)

Rank	Urban area	Image	State	Urban areas (Eurostat)[1]	Urban areas (Demographia)[2]	Agglomerations (UN WUP)[3]	Density (per km^2; Demographia)	Annual growth rate (%; Demographia)
1	London		United Kingdom	12,200,000	10,236,000	10,313,307	5,900	0.07
2	Paris		France	11,800,000	10,858,000	10,843,285	3,800	0.83
3	Madrid		Spain	6,600,000	6,171,000	6,199,254	4,600	0.27
4	Ruhr area		Germany	5,100,000	6,679,000	N/A	2,800	0.01
5	Barcelona		Spain	n/a	5,355,000	5,258,319	4,300	0.12
6	Milan		Italy	n/a	5,257,000	3,098,974	2,800	−0.16
7	Berlin		Germany	n/a	4,069,000	3,563,194	2,900	0.01
8	Rome		Italy	n/a	3,906,000	3,717,956	3,400	0.89
9	Naples		Italy	n/a	3,706,000	2,201,789	3,600	0.01
10	Athens		Greece	n/a	3,484,000	3,051,899	5,000	0.29
11	Lisbon		Portugal	n/a	2,666,000	2,884,297	2,800	0.39
12	Rotterdam–The Hague		Netherlands	n/a	2,660,000	N/A	2,700	0.39
13	Manchester		United Kingdom	n/a	2,639,000	2,645,598	4,200	−0.03
14	Birmingham (West Midlands)		United Kingdom	n/a	2,512,000	2,514,596	4,200	−0.03
15	Katowice (Katowice urban area)		Poland	2,573,159	2,190,000	n/a	3,300	0.11
16	Cologne-Bonn		Germany	n/a	2,104,000	N/A	2,300	0.50
17	Brussels		Belgium	n/a	2,089,000	2,044,993	2,600	0.02[4]
18	Hamburg		Germany	n/a	2,087,000	1,830,673	2,700	0.43[4]
19	Munich		Germany	n/a	1,981,000	1,437,900	4,200	0.72[4]
20	Frankfurt		Germany	n/a	1,915,000	n/a	3,000	0.50
21	Leeds-Bradford		United Kingdom	n/a	1,893,000	1,912,493	3,900	0.24[4]
22	Bucharest		Romania	n/a	1,860,000	1,867,724	6,500	0.10[4]
23	Vienna		Austria	n/a	1,763,000	1,752,845	3,900	1.04[4]
24	Warsaw		Poland	n/a	1,720,000	1,722,310	3,200	0.67
25	Budapest		Hungary	n/a	1,710,000	1,713,903	1,900	−0.19
26	Stockholm		Sweden	n/a	1,630,000	1,485,680	4,300	0.58[4]
27	Amsterdam		Netherlands	n/a	1,624,000	1,090,772	3,200	0.41[4]
28	Lyon		France	n/a	1,583,000	1,608,712	1,300	0.50[4]
29	Valencia		Spain	n/a	1,561,000		5,700	0.29[4]
30	Sevilla		Spain	n/a	1,533,230		5,600
31	Turin		Italy	n/a	1,521,000	1,764,868	4,100	−0.16[4]
32	Porto		Portugal	n/a	1,474,000	1,299,437	1,900
33	Marseille		France	n/a	1,397,000	1,605,046	3,100	0.46[4]
34	Stuttgart		Germany	n/a	1,379,000		2,900
35	Sofia		Bulgaria	1,543,377	1,316,557	1,226,155	5,700	0.78[4]
36	Prague		Czech Republic	n/a	1,310,000	1,313,557	4,600	−0.07[4]
37	Copenhagen		Denmark	n/a	1,231,000	1,268,052	2,700	0.04[4]
38	Helsinki		Finland	n/a	1,203,000	1,179,916	2,400	0.81[4]
39	Glasgow		United Kingdom	n/a	1,182,000	1,222,955	3,300	0.07[4]
40	Dublin		Ireland	n/a	1,158,000	1,169,371	2,500	1.14[4]
41	Lille		France,  Belgium	n/a	1,016,000	1,027,178	2,200	0.50[4]
42	Antwerpen		Belgium	n/a	990,000		1,500	0.05[4]
43	Nice		France	n/a	962,000		1,300	0.52[4]
44	Łódź		Poland	n/a	939,000		5,000	−0.67[4]
45	Toulouse		France	n/a	880,000		1,100	0.72[4]
46	Liverpool		United Kingdom	n/a	864,000		4,400	0.11[4]
47	South Hampshire		United Kingdom	n/a	856,000
48	Bordeaux		France	n/a	845,000		700	0.60[4]
49	Thessaloniki		Greece	n/a	840,000		4,300	0.39[4]
50	Florence		Italy	n/a	821,000		3,700
51	Zagreb		Croatia	n/a	793,000		4,400
52	Newcastle upon Tyne (Tyneside)		United Kingdom	n/a	780,000		4,200	0.16[4]
53	Gdańsk (Tricity)		Poland	n/a	775,000		5,000
54	Kraków		Poland	n/a	760,000		3,500
55	Bilbao		Spain	n/a	750,000		5,800
56	Riga		Latvia	n/a	750,000		2,900
57	Palermo		Italy	n/a	731,000		6,000	0.12[4]
58	Nottingham		United Kingdom	n/a	730,000		4,200
59	Catania		Italy	n/a	720,000		2,900
60	Málaga		Spain	n/a	700,000		3,600
61	Las Palmas		Spain	n/a	700,000		6,800
62	Zaragoza		Spain	n/a	700,000		5,700
63	Dresden		Germany	n/a	700,000		2,200
64	Hannover		Germany	n/a	700,000		2,500
65	Sheffield		United Kingdom	n/a	685,000		4,000
66	Nürnberg		Germany	n/a	660,000		3,000
67	Bremen		Germany	n/a	650,000		2,400
68	Utrecht		Netherlands	n/a	650,000		3,900
69	Genova		Italy	n/a	625,000		2,400
70	Bristol		United Kingdom	n/a	617,000		3,900
71	Wrocław		Poland	n/a	600,000		4,800
72	Poznań		Poland	n/a	600,000		2,700
73	Nantes		France	n/a	585,000		1,100
74	Belfast		United Kingdom	n/a	580,000		3,500
75	Leipzig		Germany	n/a	575,000		2,000
76	Toulon		France	n/a	559,000		700
77	Mannheim		Germany	n/a	552,000		3,500
78	Liège		Belgium	n/a	550,000		1,900
79	Vilnius		Lithuania	n/a	550,000	649,000	2,500
80	Gothenburg		Sweden	n/a	550,000		2,700
81	Saarbrücken		Germany	n/a	515,000		2,200
82	Douai-Lens		France	n/a	510,000		1,100
83	Bologna		Italy	n/a	510,000		3,300
84	Aachen		Germany	n/a	510,000		1,500
85	Leicester		United Kingdom	n/a	509,000
86	Grenoble		France	n/a	505,000		985
87	Köln		Germany	n/a	N/A	1,036,771	N/A	N/A

Top 15 urban areas by population

Paris (1)

London (2)

Ruhr Area (3)

Madrid (4)

Milan (5)

Barcelona (6)

Berlin (7)

Rome (8)

Naples (9)

Athens (10)

Lisbon (11)

Rotterdam - The Hague (12)

Manchester (13)

Birmingham(West Midlands)(14)

Katowice (15)

Location of the top 15 urban areas by population in the European Union.

See also

• List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits
• List of larger urban zones in the European Union (metropolitan area)
• List of urban areas in Europe
• List of urban areas by population
• Blue Banana

References

1. Eurostat: Statistics on European cities. Retrieved 19 September 2016.
2. Demographia: World Urban Areas. Retrieved 6 September 2015.
3. Annual Population of Urban Agglomerations with 300,000 Inhabitants or More in 2014, by Country, 1950-2030 (thousands), World Urbanization Prospects, the 2014 revision, Population Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. Retrieved 6 September 2015. Note: List based on estimates for 2015, from 2014.
4. United Nations: World Urbanization Prospects

External links

• United Nations list of urban agglomerations in the European Union (as tabulated by INSEE).
• Population of urban areas provided by UK National Statistics for UK urban areas
• e-Geopolis: research group, university of Paris-Diderot, France - About world urbanization