We all know New York City to be packed with people, so it’d be interesting to take a look at the most densely populated cities in the world vs. Manhattan.
Manhattan is filled with people at every corner, especially in midtown. The trains during rush hour are so packed you can forget about personal space. It no longer exists. You’ve now become closer to the disheveled man next to you than you’ve ever been to another person in your life. Walking down the street is like that typical TV/movie scene where the camera focuses in on the main character’s sad face and then it pans out to show them moving at a glacial pace in the large crowd of people on the street as if they’re cattle. It’s almost funny how many people are on the street at any given time, like Times Square, for example. Of course, there are less consistently populated areas, like downtown, but the mass amounts of apartments prove otherwise.
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New York City is one of the biggest cities in the world, and it has five boroughs, or sections, of it, with Manhattan being the most densely populated, which is why that’s what we’re using as our comparison. Big cities like this tend to be places people like to visit and enjoy in small doses rather than live, but I actually enjoy the fact that there are so many people around me all the time. Unless I’m in a bad mood, in which case even when the train car is empty except for one person I’m a little miffed, but I digress.
In order to create this list, we had to find some sources as starting points. We looked at Nations Online, Telegraph, and City/Mayors Statistics to find each city’s ranking on population density and averaged them from all sources. Since we want to compare them all to Manhattan, we found Manhattan’s currency population density, which, according to World Population Review, is 70,826 people per sqKm. The cities that have the closest population density to Manhattan are at the top of the list. It’d be interesting to see how many of the cities on this list come from the most densely populated countries in the world.
Read on to learn more about the most densely populated cities in the world vs. Manhattan.
25. Sao Paulo, Brazil
Population: 17,000,000
Land area: 1,968 sqKm
Population density: 9,000 people per sqKm
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24. Hyderabad, India
Population: 5,300,000
Land area: 583 sqKm
Population density: 9,100 people per sqKm
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23. Shenyang, China
Population: 4,200,000
Land area: 453 sqKm
Population density: 9,250 people per sqKm
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22. Baghdad, Iraq
Population: 5,500,000
Land area: 596 sqKm
Population density: 9,250 people per sqKm
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21. Cairo, Egypt
Population: 12,200,000
Land area: 1,295 sqKm
Population density: 9,400 people per sqKm
20. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Population: 4,900,000
Land area: 518 sqKm
Population density: 9,450 people per sqKm
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19. Bangalore, India
Population: 5,400,000
Land area: 534 sqKm
Population density: 10,100 people per sqKm
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18. Tianjin, China
Population: 4,750,000
Land area: 453 sqKm
Population density: 10,500 people per sqKm
17. Jakarta, Indonesia
Population: 14,250,000
Land area: 1,360 sqKm
Population density: 10,500 people per sqKm
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16. Tehran, Iran
Population: 7,250,000
Land area: 686 sqKm
Population density: 10,550 people per sqKm
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15. Manila, Philippines
Population: 14,750,000
Land area: 1,399 sqKm
Population density: 10,550 people per sqKm
14. Kinshasa, Congo
Population: 5,000,000
Land area: 469 sqKm
Population density: 10,650 people per sqKm
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13. Delhi, India
Population: 14,300,000
Land area: 1,295 sqKm
Population density: 11,050 people per sqKm
12. Beijing, China
Population: 8,614,000
Land area: 748 sqKm
Population density: 11,500 people per sqKm
We’re halfway through our list of most densely populated cities in the world vs. Manhattan, and now, let’s see what’s next.
11. Lima, Peru
Population: 7,000,000
Land area: 596 sqKm
Population density: 11,750 people per sqKm
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10. Shanghai, China
Population: 10,000,000
Land area: 746 sqKm
Population density: 13,400 people per sqKm
9. Bogota, Colombia
Population: 7,000,000
Land area: 518 sqKm
Population density: 13,500 people per sqKm
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8. Chennai, India
Population: 5,950,000
Land area: 414 sqKm
Population density: 14,350 people per sqKm
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7. Taipei, Taiwan
Population: 5,700,000
Land area: 376 sqKm
Population density: 15,200 people per sqKm
6. Seoul/Incheon, South Korea
Population: 17,500,000
Land area: 1,049 sqKm
Population density: 16,700 people per sqKm
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5. Shenzhen, China
Population: 8,000,000
Land area: 466 sqKm
Population density: 17,150 people per sqKm
4. Lagos, Nigeria
Population: 13,400,000
Land area: 738 sqKm
Population density: 18,150 people per sqKm
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3. Karachi, Pakistan
Population: 9,800,000
Land area: 518 sqKm
Population density: 18,150 people per sqKm
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2. Kolkata, India
Population: 12,700,000
Land area: 531 sqKm
Population density: 23,900 people per sqKm
1. Mumbai, India
Population: 14,350,000
Land area: 484 sqKm
Population density: 29,650 people per sqKm
That concludes our list of the most densely populated cities in the world vs. Manhattan. Perhaps it gave you an idea of just how crowded different places around the world are compared to somewhere you may have already visited.
