Original MapBench study · 2026-10-14
Which Major Cities Have the Largest Dataset Population Within 1,000 km?
We sum the approximate populations attached to peer cities inside a fixed 1,000 km great-circle radius.
What the ranking shows
Approximate populations attached to peer cities within 1,000 km are summed.
Wuhan ranks first with roughly 149.1 million people represented by peer-city entries inside 1,000 km.
| Rank | City | Country | Peer cities | Peer population |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wuhan | China | 9 | 149.1m |
| 2 | Ahmedabad | India | 6 | 99.8m |
| 3 | Taipei | Taiwan | 6 | 92.9m |
| 4 | Xi'an | China | 4 | 86.9m |
| 5 | Hanoi | Vietnam | 5 | 86.5m |
| 6 | Pune | India | 6 | 80.8m |
| 7 | Guangzhou | China | 6 | 80.3m |
| 8 | Chongqing | China | 5 | 73.2m |
| 9 | Kathmandu | Nepal | 3 | 70.5m |
| 10 | Busan | South Korea | 7 | 69.1m |
| 11 | Hyderabad | India | 5 | 60.9m |
| 12 | Hong Kong | China (SAR) | 5 | 59.4m |
| 13 | Chengdu | China | 3 | 57.3m |
| 14 | Mumbai | India | 5 | 55.3m |
| 15 | Seoul | South Korea | 5 | 54.8m |
| 16 | Islamabad | Pakistan | 4 | 53.4m |
| 17 | Bengaluru | India | 5 | 50.1m |
| 18 | Kabul | Afghanistan | 4 | 49.9m |
| 19 | Shenzhen | China | 5 | 49.3m |
| 20 | Beirut | Lebanon | 8 | 47.3m |
Method
This is not gridded population and does not include everyone living inside the circle; it sums only population values attached to dataset cities.
Important caveat
This is a ranking inside MapBench's curated major-city dataset, not a complete census of every settlement on Earth. Population values are approximate and city-centre coordinates are used consistently for comparison.
The study is useful for reproducible geographic comparison and method demonstrations. It should not be cited as an official global urban ranking without this scope note.
Reproduce the measurements
Use MapBench tools and the downloadable dataset to check individual values or reproduce the ranking.