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UN: Jakarta overtakes Tokyo to become world's most populous city

2025-11-27 08:53:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

Jakarta has overtaken Tokyo as the world's most populous city, according to a UN study. The Indonesian capital is home to 42 million people, according to an estimate by the population division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs in its "World Urbanization Prospects 2025" report released this month.

Jakarta is followed by Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka, with 37 million people. With a population of 33 million, Tokyo, defined in the study as a megalopolis spanning three neighboring prefectures, ranks third. The change in ranking is the result of a new methodology that is more consistent in how it categorizes cities, towns and rural areas, according to UN officials.

The number of people living in cities has more than doubled since 1950, when urban dwellers made up 20% of the world's 2.5 billion people, according to the report. They now make up nearly half of the planet's 8.2 billion people. By 2050, two-thirds of global population growth is projected to occur in cities.

The number of megacities, defined as those with at least 10 million inhabitants, has quadrupled from eight in 1975 to 33 in 2025. Nine of the 10 most populous cities, Jakarta, Dhaka, Tokyo, New Delhi, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Cairo, Manila, Kolkata and Seoul, are in Asia.

Metropolitan Tokyo's 33 million residents are spread across a vast area that includes the surrounding prefectures of Saitama, Chiba and Kanagawa. The latter includes Yokohama, which itself is a city of 3.7 million.

Under the new criteria, Tokyo was the world's most populous city until around 2010, when it was replaced by Jakarta. While the Tokyo region used in the UN study has followed the rest of Japan in experiencing population decline in recent years, the city itself is heading in the opposite direction.

Net migration to the Japanese capital slowed during the Covid-19 pandemic but has since recovered, driven by an influx of young people seeking job and education opportunities, according to Japan's internal affairs ministry. /CNA