Talk:List of largest cities/Archive 2

Recent changes
Hi all, I think we need a discussion on the recent changes. Especially dividing the list into two arbitrary categories, megacities or "cities over a million inhabitants". The latter is most problematic because now the list is very much incomplete, there are dozens and dozens of cities that have over a million people that are not listed. I think this bar is set way too low for a general article of "list of largest cities". Even a minimum of 3 million would make this list extremely long. What are your thoughts? Mattximus (talk) 16:22, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Completely agree with . India has 46 cities with over a million population, China has 160 cities with over a milion population. These two countries alone would contribute a total of 206 cities. Not to mention other big countries such as Brazil and Indonesia. Bluesatellite (talk) 06:29, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * My proposal is, why don't we just include Top 100 largest cities (either city proper, metropolitan area, or urban area... whichever the highest populated). Listing cities with only 10 million population would just replicate the Megacity article, and we should keep in mind that we have already had List of cities proper by population, List of urban areas by population, and List of metropolitan areas by population. Bluesatellite (talk) 06:37, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * It was my suggestion a while back to simply merge those latter three into this article, but did not get much support... It's all duplication and easier to maintain 1 page than 4 pages. Mattximus (talk) 13:40, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * But I think we can agree that this "1 million population" criterion is just too damn low for the so-called world's largest cities. Bluesatellite (talk) 15:27, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I think that dividing the list is not a good idea while rising the threshold is a good idea. I prefer a specific population level rather than the arbitrarily set top xxx list.Jklamo (talk) 20:02, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Where is Berlin?
Couldn't find Berlin and yet found smaller cities here


 * Why don't you add it? All you need is a proper citation. Mattximus (talk) 22:58, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Toronto?
Is there some reason Toronto is not on this list?&mdash;Anne Delong (talk) 02:38, 13 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Added, this page became a complete mess when one user separated the list into two arbitrary lists...

Taipei, Taiwan
Taipei, Taiwan has a total population of 2.5 million people. If you include the suburbs, the total rises to nearly 7 million people. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Clubzombie (talk • contribs) 03:07, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

Well, I am not doodcat table format and not sure which of the two lists to choose. Otherwise, I would have done it. - - Prairieplant (talk) 07:39, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Yeah I still have no idea why the tables were split, this list needs a huge overhaul. Mattximus (talk) 22:48, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Chicago is not listed.
Chicago is not on either list. Here are the population numbers from the Wikipedia infobox. Population (2010)[6] • City 2,695,598 • Estimate (2018) 2,705,994 • Rank 3rd, U.S. • Density 11,841/sq mi (4,572/km2) • Urban 8,667,303[5] • Metro 9,533,040 (3rd)[4] • CSA 9,901,711 (US: 3rd)[4]

I hope it can be added where it belongs. - -Prairieplant (talk) 06:51, 18 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Prairieplant why don't you add it? Mattximus (talk) 23:12, 18 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Well, I would have done it, but I am not clear which list to choose, and table format is not a strong point with me. I hoped someone who understood the split of tables could move the data in. - - Prairieplant (talk) 07:44, 19 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I added it to the list, and tried to clean it up. There are *a lot* of unsourced numbers, which should really all go. I also think we should merge this list with the list of largest cities by city proper, urban area, and metropolitan area since they are just redundant to this list... Then we will have more eyes on this one list and can make it much more accurate and complete. Mattximus (talk) 21:32, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Missing cities
After this merge there appears to be some missing cities, maybe they can be collected here for discussion?


 * Ningbo should be on this list, it's a much larger city than Chicago, which is on this list... Mattximus (talk) 14:49, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Are you sure Ningbo is larger than Chicago? It's not even close, really. Ningbo's urban population is "only" 3,525,000 (world's rank #134), while Chicago's is 9,275,000 (world's rank #41). Per the article's title "largest" cities, hence being "large" is not enough. Bluesatellite (talk) 11:36, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
 * That Chicago population you quoted includes an absolute massive area well beyond the city of Chicago into 3 different states! The Ningbo number you quote is just downtown. If you count the downtown Chicago (2.7 million) vs downtown Ningbo (3.5 million) then yes, it's not even close. Mattximus (talk) 20:08, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Downtown Chicago has about 33,442 residents, and I don't know what size is considered "downtown" for Ningbo. After all, downtown is not a part of definition for this page. Bluesatellite (talk) 01:09, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Sorry the municipal boundary of Chicago, what most people refer to as Chicago, has 2.7 million whereas the equivalent urban core of Ningbo has 3.5 million. Does that clarify? Mattximus (talk) 02:32, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * That's still not comparable tho. Municipal boundary means city proper. Municipal boundary for Ningbo encompasses a land of 9,816 km² and includes many rural areas. Bluesatellite (talk) 03:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes it is. The municipal boundary of Ningbo (8 million) is comparable to the very large area of three states around Chicago (the 9 million figure), and the Chicago part of Chicago is 2.7 million comparable to the urban area of Ningbo (3.5 million). If you visit both cities, you will get the impression that Ningbo is the bigger city. If the fact that urban Ningbo is bigger than Chicago, I'm not sure how else to explain, Ningbo is a bigger city. Mattximus (talk) 11:23, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I see, I get your point. But we can't just compare the "urban area" of Ningbo with the "city proper" of Chicago, when the urbanisation of the latter is clearly beyond its administrative border. This is the satellite image of both cities from Google Earth (eye-altitude = 103km). That picture shows that Chicago is in fact bigger than Ningbo. Bluesatellite (talk) 12:20, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Agreed that you can't compare those two, but as soon as you leave the "downtown" chicago, you get detached homes. When you leave downtown Ningbo, you still get skyscrapers. The high density area is far larger in Ningbo than Chicago. I think at the very least it should be included on this list. Mattximus (talk) 22:40, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * You probably right, that's why I'm considering this page among the controversial lists, (like List of best-selling music artists which failed WP:FLC twice). I'm sure that Ningbo is physically bigger than some of Chinese cities in this page such as Baoding and Nanyang, but the thing with Ningbo is that its administrative population is below 10m and its urban population is below 5m. Bluesatellite (talk) 00:08, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

data mismatch between urban area and metro area
There are several cities on this list with apparent mismatches in population numbers between urban area and metro area. Do we have any guidance on how we should proceed with these? e.g. Jakarta is listed as having a population of 33,430,285 in its metro area that is 7,063 Km2 large, but a population of 34,365,000 in less than half that space (3,367 Km2). New York also has the same issue. I'm assuming this is the case due to the dynamic nature of population counts, and I certainly recognize the difficulty in getting accurate counts, especially given that "metropolitan area" and "urban area" don't have legal bases. Nonetheless the above lines seem silly, and I think it degrades the credibility of this list to leave them as-is.

Thoughts? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hallas (talk • contribs) 01:25, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Different source and different year of estimation. Anyway, metropolitan area does have legal basis in some countries. Jakarta metropolitan area is backed by a Presidential Regulation and has a co-working organisation. Another example is Metro Manila, which also has an official organisation. I have to agree that urban area is more like analysis and estimation. Bluesatellite (talk) 03:00, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 07:06, 28 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Nanjing Skyline 2012.jpg

Use of Demographia website over official census counts
For urban population, we are lucky that the China has a census derived definition for urban population, which is an actual count, not a vague estimate by a single individual who runs demographia of what constitutes urban population in his personal opinion. Should we use estimates (with unclear methodology...) from his website, or actual numbers of people for Chinese cities based on the official census? Mattximus (talk) 18:37, 2 April 2020 (UTC)
 * can we please, first and foremost, stop edit warring over this and discuss it rationally here? I think this is a very tricky issue, and maybe there's no right or wrong answer, but a few thoughts:
 * Demographia is borderline as a reliable source IMHO. Although it clearly makes reasonable assumptions about the cities, it is ultimately written by one guy as a private project without fact checking (and, as an aside, I'm not even totally convinced that Wendell Cox is notable in the first place).
 * While it's true that the list of urban areas used Demographia, and was merged into this list recently, that doesn't mean we're duty-bound to continue following that source forever. Any decisions should be based on giving the most accurate verified information, not just sticking to what's gone before.
 * I totally see the value of Bluemoonset's point about using a single source, though. One of the biggest flaw in this space has always been the wildly different methodologies used by individual countries in measuring their city sizes. It's just a great pity that no genuine reliable sources have done the sort of analysis we need, for use as a secondary source.
 * I would also suggest that we relax the 10 million city proper rule, as the stated goal of "reducing the number of Chinese cities", in retrospect, doesn't seem to be something we should be doing. If lots of Chinese cities have large city-proper populations then that's the way it is, and it's not our job to massage the figures to offset this fact. Given that I believe the plan (as discussed above) is to move to ordering by urban population when the page is loaded, I don't think the impact will be that big on the reader anyway. Maybe consider moving to 5 million minimum in any of the three categories as a bar for entry? &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 09:34, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Hmmm, Demographia is an urban consulting firm, not personal homework, and has been published by a lot of reliable sources.. I told you again, this page is titled "List of largest cities", there's a superlative in there. If we used 5 million baseline for "city proper", there would be 89 cities in China alone to be included (way more than the entire number of world's cities that already on the list right now), and that would be unmanageable. The problem with Mattximus is that he cherrypicks source, not view the overall scope. Bluesatellite (talk) 10:21, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Fair enough on Demographia, and thanks for the links asserting its notability as a reference source. And certainly it's better to defer to a source like that rather than trying to make judgements ourselves about what is and isn't a valid urban area. Like Mattximus, I too was initially a little baffled about the Boston-Providence amalgamation, but actually looking at the map it seems like there is a solid uninterrupted belt of proper urban residential urban land stretching all the way from the edge of Boston to the edge of Providence so it probably is legitimate. And crucially, we don't have to make that determination here using original research, because Demographia has done that for us.
 * Are you saying that because one man who runs a website lumped Boston together with Providence, a city from another state, with rural land between them, that Providence is part of Boston? Mattximus (talk) 14:28, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * On the question of Chinese cities, I think that's a more questionable decision. By saying "there would be 89 Chinese cities, which would be unmanageable", that means we're choosing our benchmarks based on what we think the list ought to look like, rather than simply reporting the facts. To be honest, although I voted strongly to merge the lists, I'm starting to wonder if it was such a wise idea after all... I'm not saying we would go back to the previous status quo, where each page was managed separately under entirely different rules, but the idea of listing city-proper and urban population in a single table, when the entries are quite significantly different between the two lists, is proving problematic. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 10:53, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * There are currently 25 cities proper with 10 million population on this page. I think, it's already answered the "what is/are the largest cities proper in the world?" question. We should not put undue weight on a certain stuff which overshadows the "largest cities" itself. List of cities in China by population is there, isn't it? Everything doesn't have to be here. Bluesatellite (talk) 11:39, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks Amakuru, you reflected my concerns perfectly. Now I was mostly concerned with Bluesatellites anti-Chinese bias when he said "There're already a total of 23 Chinese cities on this page, is that still not enough?" It's not a matter of opinion how many cities are enough, it's simply a matter of whether they are large cities or not. Changsha is much larger than many cities on this list. But it was deleted because it was "Chinese". Can you see the problem? By the way, Bluesatellite reverted even though I proposed this discussion showing bad faith.


 * A second point, is demographia. It was only the source for 1/3 of the merged lists, and the weakest one because it's based on one man's interpretation of second hand census data, which is original research on his part. Keep in mind, Wendell Cox is an anti-public transport advocate and promotes car use and highway construction, so his definitions of urban area might be biased towards low density suburbs, which nearly every other urban planner would not consider urban. We have official census data, which is 2nd hand, and really what we should be basing wikipedia off of. I worked in census field before, and first hand data (one gathered by the census takers) is not available to the public for privacy reasons. Regardless, Changsha is a much much much bigger "city" than Boston, so why is Boston on this list and not Changsha? Besides Bluesatellites anti-Chinese bias? Mattximus (talk) 14:25, 3 April 2020 (UTC)


 * A third point is that blusatellite broke the edit warring 3RR rule by reverting my change 3 times. Please see Edit_warring, even though I offered a discussion first. Let's resolve the situation here, or we can take it to arbitration. Mattximus (talk) 14:34, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Changsha is much larger than many cities on this list. But it was deleted because it was "Chinese". Can you see the problem? --> Much larger city according to what? Your original research? Dude, I deleted that city NOT because it's a Chinese city, but because it's not as many populous as Demographia said, which mismatch the rest of the cities' figures. I stick with consistency! Don't try to twist my purpose, please. Bluesatellite (talk) 03:09, 4 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Bluesatellite, your claims of original research are wrong. The official urban area census figures for Changsha has 5,320,300 people in 1,199.84 sqkm. Which would put it on this list without question. Demographia uses 3,900,000 million people in 738 sqkm. If you were an outsider, which would you trust more? Official census data, or one person (demographia)'s opinion of what constitutes an urban area based off his interpretation of local government population estimates (he does not provide the source or date) and satellite images (he does not provide the methodology or date of the image). What part of this analysis is "original research"? Mattximus (talk) 21:09, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

I quoted you directly about your removal of Chinese cities, how is that twisting your words? It is not a given that demographia is a reliable source, an it is not a source for two thirds of this table. I will bring demographia up for a source review to see if it’s at all appropriate for anywhere on Wikipedia, let alone this page. I added the city because the urban census figures places it near the middle of this list. Also please familiarize yourself with the three revert rule... you’re supposed to discuss before you revert 3 times. Mattximus (talk) 03:16, 4 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Ironically, you only use that Chinese reference to Changsha, but keep using Demographia for the rest of the article, even all of the other Chinese urban areas. Why is that? That's a bias decision to accomodate a certain city, which according to your personal opinion is bigger than the others! Bluesatellite (talk) 03:21, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Not at all, its a great idea Bluesatellite, we should use the census figures for urban areas for all cities in China. I actually started doing this but you reverted me, so I stopped. I'm having a hard time understanding your anti-Chinese bias. Imagine I took your words and said ""There're already a total of 23 European cities on this page, is that still not enough?" Wouldn't you have some questions for me about my anti-European bias? Mattximus (talk) 14:16, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Year, right? Keep campaigning that I'm anti-Chinese. I have spent much of my times to reconstruct this page, when it has been a goddamn mess for years and years, and you don't even show any appreciation at least for once. User:Amakuru even showed his gratitude, not that I'm thirst for it, I'm not! Bluesatellite (talk) 03:00, 7 April 2020 (UTC)


 * You didn't address my attempt to show you why I said anti-chinese. I guess I should clarify the issue, cities like Changsha are one of largest in the world. With over 5 million people in just the urban core (unless you claim official census data is wrong and that Wendell Cox knows more than the census bureau!), it's far larger than at least a third of the cities on this list. Have you been to these places? If you took 100 people and tour them around Changsha and Boston, how many would say Boston is the bigger city? Zero? Isn't that the purpose of this list, to list the largest cities? Mattximus (talk) 13:47, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Ordering
Hello, and thanks to all those who have successfully pushed for and merged the confusing forked topics regarding this, into one sortable list. I am very glad to see this change. Just one note though - I don't think the current ordering is the correct one. It looks like it's using the largest value found in any of the three columns for ordering, but that means it's effectively comparing apples and oranges. In particular, cities like Chongqing, as well as lots of other prefecture-level cities in China, are all inflated compared with what a "common-sense" test would say is their population relative to other cities. Don't get me wrong, it's quite correct that the "city proper" population for Chongqing is 30 million, and the column should say that, but that should not mean that Chongqing is pushed up the list. By most definitions of a city, Shanghai is clearly the largest in China.

I recommend that we simply order them all by urban area by default, that seems to be the most objective measure (given that metro area definitions and city-proper boundaries vary widely) with obviously allowing the user to order by one of the other columns if they so desire. Thanks &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 13:59, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I second your proposal. At first, I thought since this page is a hybrid of the former three lists, then the ordering somehow has to combine the former lists' ranks as well. But your explanation sounds logical to me. Bluesatellite (talk) 14:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Right, and I can see the logic in that - that decision wasn't explicitly made during the merge discussion. I think we're agreed that the alternative approach will still be better though. The only remaining question then would be what to do about the eligibility criteria for how large a city needs to be. In particular whether cities like Baoding, Nanyang, Linyi, etc. which are only included because their city proper is more than 5 million, would be kept or dropped. Whichever way you do it, there will be "missing" entries near the bottom when you sort by one or other of the columns... Cheers &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 14:37, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * While revamping this list on my sandbox, I found that China has literally tons of cities proper with 5 million population. A total of 89 cities, unbelievable! Just count it if you don't believe me lol. So, I decided to be WP:BOLD and raise the figure to 10 million for city proper. Nevertheless, we still have 14 Chinese cities, as you can see now on the list. Any thought on alternative criteria? Bluesatellite (talk) 15:47, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * yeah, that seems reasonable to me. The China issue arises because of their Prefecture-level city concept where regard they entire administrative districts, which encompass vast areas of populated rural hinterland, as being coterminous with the central city. I don't really know what the answer to this is, but probably having the 10 million minimum will ensure that only a few outliers make it into the list. And most of those have decent-sized urban cores anyway. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 16:14, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Agree, the current ordering is comparing apples to oranges. I think we should sort by city proper, because it's the only non-arbitrary and consistent definition no matter the source. Both urban area (the numbers we use are just made up by some guy in St Louis for his blog I think), and metropolitan area are completely arbitrary and differ depending on the source. So sorting by either urban area or metropolitan area is apples to oranges. The only true apples to apples is city proper. Mattximus (talk) 22:42, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I am totally against sorting based on city proper, because it will put all those inflated Chinese cities at the top. It's the most inconsistent definition you can actually get, fan from being the same apples. Also, the comment "some guy for his blog" is an insult to Wendell Cox and his firm, whose works have been published by major newspapers. Bluesatellite (talk) 23:21, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Then you are comparing apples to oranges. Remember urban area and metropolitan area are completely arbitrary, depending on who feels like drawing the border. And yes, that source, demographia, is 3rd or fourth hand information, which, I would consider low quality, especially as what constitutes urban area is just made up by that guy that you linked. Ideally, every single value on this page should come from national censuses, which is second hand data. However, there are still several countries without census or equivalent institutions thus third hand sources could be used, but only in those cases. Mattximus (talk) 23:27, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Then leave it as the way it is now, because no matter what definition, there's always flaw. Bluesatellite (talk) 23:36, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, sorting by multiple definitions simultaneously means this list could never pass featured list status in the future, if the page is going that way. If you don't care about peer review, then yeah let's keep it this way. If you do want to eventually put this list through a peer review, using one non-arbitrary definition would be the best, with the caveat that Australian cities are under represented, and Chinese cities over represented, however that's the whole point of having the other two columns isn't it? Mattximus (talk) 23:41, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I agree that sorting by urban area is the best option.Jklamo (talk) 23:51, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Agreed. I think it's the only comparable figure to be honest. Bluesatellite (talk) 10:32, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Seems there is a consensus to use urban area. I am going to implement that.Jklamo (talk) 08:09, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I disagree as the urban area is an arbitrary list based on one man's (Wendell Cox) opinion of what constitutes an urban area. I put the source up for source review and the conclusion was that official census should be used first, and if Wendell Cox's information is to be used it should be stated explicitly in the text (according to demographia...). Mattximus (talk) 15:38, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Boston
Boston's urban population of 7,130,000 million people is not accurate at all. For some reason the note said it includes the completely separate city of Providence, Rhode Island which by nobody's definition is part of Boston's urban area. Is there any explanation why a city in a different state 50 miles away is included in this sum? Mattximus (talk) 18:43, 2 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Doing some digging, it appears one person, Wendell Cox, who is an anti-public transport advocate and promoter of car use and highway construction, decided to merge these two cities into one city. This is a problem, since his definitions of urban area might be biased towards low density suburbs, which explains why no other source I can find merges Providence into Boston. I'm wondering if demographia is a reliable source at all? Thoughts? Mattximus (talk) 14:57, 3 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Further research has found that no demographia is not a good resource for statistic, see . They raise similar issues that because Wendell Cox is a lobbyist for car based planning, he uses incorrect definitions for density, including far more area than reasonable to other researchers. His work is not peer reviewed and as such I’m leaning towards completely removing his website as a reliable source on Wikipedia. Thoughts? Mattximus (talk) 21:55, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Without defending Wendell Cox too much, since I don't know much about him, it's possible his decision to consider Boston and Providence as one urban area does match with commonly used methodologies. Here in the UK, the office for national statistics compiles urban area definitions, and its rule is that if there is a gap of more than 50 metres between the last house of one town and the last house of another town, they are considered separate urban areas. Otherwise they're considered part of the same urban area. This leads to slightly odd situations such as Liverpool and Birkenhead, seen on a map here: which most people would consider to be one urban area, but they are classified separately because the width of the river between the two is more than 50 metres. But using that definition, I don't think there actually is any gap of more than fifty metres between houses if you take a certain route between Boston and Providence. On the other point, the concerns raised by other sites online does cause some worry - it might be something to raise at Reliable sources/Noticeboard and see what the consensus is there. It may just be that Auckland have an axe to grind because their own city missed the cut compared to somewhere else, though....  &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 23:07, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

That’s a great idea, I’ll do a bit more research and bring demographia up to the notice board to see what others think. Thanks! Mattximus (talk) 03:11, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Yeah yeah, and don't forget to research alternative sources of "urban area" for all of the other cities, not only some you favor. Thanks! Bluesatellite (talk) 03:26, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
 * So does that mean you will keep reverting me if I use official census data instead of Wendell Cox's third hand analysis? Mattximus (talk) 13:47, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The definitions may differ between different country's official censuses. So its best not to use them but instead a secondary source. I'm not defending Demographia though if you read through the data it says they limit urban areas to be inside a metropolitan area without any attempt at consistently defining what that is. Eopsid (talk) 12:54, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

San Diego
1.42 Million people, not in the table https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Diego — Preceding unsigned comment added by 162.204.183.166 (talk) 02:28, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Changsha has 5,320,300 people in just the urban core, and it's not allowed on this list. Everything has to go through Bluesatellite who is the owner of this page and determines what is added and what is not added. Mattximus (talk) 15:56, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Wow, that's very respectful of you. After years and years of messiness in this article, I'm the one who actually put an effort (big effort tbh) to make this list verifiable and readable, as well as deleting the duplicates. So, thank you for your compliment! Bluesatellite (talk) 23:44, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * You immediately reverted my efforts, without even discussing on the talk page. Isn't that what my tongue in cheek comment was trying to say? You revert *every* change that doesn't meet your opinion of a good change. It's not the spirit of wikipedia. Please review WP:3RR, I didn't submit your name there last time you did 3 reverts in a row, but next time I will, because it's not a collaborative attitude. Mattximus (talk) 03:11, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Possible solution!
I have a possible solution. I think much of the argument over urban areas was that the data needs to be consistent. Instead of using one person's opinion (Wendell Cox, with unclear methodology), why not use the United Nations Department of Economic and Social affairs estimates? They release urban population numbers, and the UN is certainly a more reliable source that the non-peer reviewed demographia website. Example can be found here:. Is anyone opposed to using the UN estimates? Which is, by the way, what is quoted in the lead. Mattximus (talk) 18:16, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Bonus! The UN also uses a cut off of 5 million people, which we can use instead of our arbitrary cut off for this list! We actually have a source for a cutoff if we use UN data. Mattximus (talk) 18:17, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I did the change, there are exactly 81 cities with urban populations over the 5,000,000 population cut off by the UN. I think this is a good scope for this page. The urban population column is now complete, other columns do need upgrading, but that will wait for me for another day. Mattximus (talk) 19:27, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, but the UN mixed the use of "city proper", "metropolitan area", and "urban agglomeration". (See this image for the PDF screenshoot). So we can not use those figures to refer the "urban area", because it's totally misleading. Thanks Bluesatellite (talk) 23:26, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure I agree with that, the UN defines urban area one way, and Wendell Cox defines it another way (although his methodology is unclear and not peer reviewed). The UN did make this list to be comparable (some city proper definitions ARE urban areas, some metropolitan ARE urban areas). Regardless we need others to weigh in before you revert on the benefits of using UN data vs Wendell Cox's data. Mattximus (talk) 03:05, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't know what else to say. I already shown you that UN mixed those three city definitions into their list, as they explained. Bluesatellite (talk) 03:11, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * You can't be the king of this page. Others must contribute to this discussion. I argue that the UN urban areas is a better source than Wendell Cox. You say the reverse. We need other input before you automatically revert. Mattximus (talk) 03:17, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Please learn how to respect discussion and consensus, before you act. I never said UN is non-legitimate or unreliable. But UN doesn't report the actual "urban area", as I explained above. They combined "city proper", "metropolitan area", and "urban agglomeration" into their list. Bluesatellite (talk) 03:21, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Read the link you deleted, which explains how the UN defines urban areas. You haven't even shown how exactly Wendell Cox determines urban areas. I gave you an article defining exactly how the UN uses urbanized areas, and you provide no evidence for Wendell Cox's measures. Regardless, this isn't the point. The point is you revert without seeking other's input. You can't own this page, that's not how wikipedia works. Mattximus (talk) 03:34, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * This page is important to wikipedia, and your immediate reverts really harm the collaborative nature of wikipedia and push people off this site completely. If you think the United Nations data is worse than Wendell Cox's data, then discuss before you revert. Seek out other's opinions before you revert. Especially before you revert 3 times in a row. You don't own this page. I have reported your actions as edit warring here: Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring. Mattximus (talk) 03:30, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * It's discussion first, then the implementation. Not the other way around. Especially if the content is disputed. Bluesatellite (talk) 03:34, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Not at all, you make changes, and if you disagree you discuss (unless it's copyright infringement or something like that). If it was your way, nothing would ever get done on wikipedia. Please review WP:3RR, you've broken it twice. Mattximus (talk) 03:38, 14 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Comment - Mattximus and Bluesatellite, I warned both of you above not to edit war over this page, and you've done it again. While it's correct that Bluesatellite broke the 3RR, edit warring is a two-player game and you both should have reined it in sooner. The discussion above is the right course of action, but should be have been done instead of reverting on the article, not as well. On the question at hand, I have to reluctantly agree with Bluesatellite here, that the UN figures are not suitable for use in the urban areas column. As mentioned, they explicitly admit to substituting city-proper and metro-area populations for urban-area in countries which don't calculate a specific urban-area population, which means the figures for different cities are comparing apples to oranges. I say reluctantly, because as I mentioned before, like Mattximus I am still concerned about the use of demographia as a source for this - it is basically on the borderline of unpublished original research. At the moment it still appears to be the best we have, though, short of doing the original research ourselves, which is inferior. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 14:34, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I agree with you Amakuru on the need for a consistent apples to apples comparison. I created an example below which gave the UN data it's own column, because I too share concerns with demographia and WP:OR (his methodology is hidden). I see why you would not want it in the urban area column, but what about a column on it's own? The best part is the scope is defined as "Urban agglomerations over 5 million" which means we have a sourced cut off for this page. The current cut-off is arbitrary 10 million for city proper and 6 million for demographia's urban area, which is unsourced. What do you think? Mattximus (talk) 13:54, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Fully protected due to edit war
This is deeply disappointing. and, you're both good, dedicated, experienced editors. 3RR isn't the line for edit warring; you're both edit-warring to a blockable extent right now. I'm fully protecting the article for 2 days, and I'll be keeping an eye on this article. Here are a few notes: Let me know if I overlooked anything or if you have any questions. Kevin ( aka L235 · t · c) 03:37, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
 * You both have been discussing on the talk page, which is good. You're making substantive points on both sides, which I'm glad to see. That's what needs to happen more.
 * After a certain point (which we've well passed), consensus-building doesn't happen on the article – it happens on the talk page, through discussion. The activity on the article has been disruptive. If you know that someone disagrees with an edit, try to talk it out before you make it.
 * Mattximus: if Bluesatellite disagrees with you on a change, it is controversial and it should be discussed. Similarly, in response to by reverting immediately, you aren't letting anyone see the change, how can you develop consensus if nobody sees the change? –  use dispute resolution mechanisms to develop consensus. More on that in a second.
 * Also, Mattximus, in this dispute you've given the impression that you're trying to game the system by going out to three reverts on each side (which would leave the changes standing) and trying to trap Bluesatellite. If that's what you're doing, you need to cut it out – that's really not cool. Also, I see earlier on this page some comments that sound a bit passive-aggressive and are accusing Mattximus of OWNership, including by reference as a third party. Try not to do that, please.
 * Bluesatellite, it sounds like Mattximus is frustrated about your perceived OWNership of this article. That may or may not be fair, and it sounds like getting this page right matters a lot to you both. Please try to show some empathy and compassion for Mattximus here; in a dispute it can be hard but it'll make this all go better.
 * I know none of what I said above means a whole lot if it seems like the dispute isn't getting resolved one way or another. I'm sure you're both familiar with WP:DR, but now is a good time to start considering 3O, DRN, or an RfC. Bottom line: if after the protection expires it looks like one of you is edit-warring, unduly pushing your own changes, or otherwise editing in a disruptive manner, I'm not going to hesitate much to start blocking people from editing this article. Please don't make me do that. To your point, Mattximus, that you feel that you can't get outside opinions on this article, that's what RfCs are designed for. If you two can't agree on a compromise, it might be a good chance for you both to identify the core issues you're stuck on and, if appropriate, submit them to RfC.
 * Also, one more thing. If one of you is trying to form a consensus through discussion during the full protection period, and the other isn't, and the person who isn't tries to jam through changes after the full protection period, I'm going to consider that disruptive editing and refusal to engage with the consensus-building process. Best, Kevin ( aka L235 · t · c) 03:44, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Compromise format?
What do you think about this format? The lead of the article is based on UN definitions, so we really should use the UN list of largest cities as the basis of this page. What about something like this as a compromise, that maintains Wendell Cox's definitions, whatever my opinion on his obscure methods, but also matches better with the lead. I also added the source to the two columns in question (this was the advice from the source review of demographia, to mention explicitly where it comes from).

I honestly think this will satisfy most people. The only controversial thing is removing city proper definition, because that column was pretty random apples to oranges comparison, and more based on language than anything comparable. What do you think of this compromise? Mattximus (talk) 22:26, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * "Urban agglomeration" header for the UN is incorrect, since they explicitly used "City proper", "Metropolitan area", and "Urban agglomeration". For example: 37,400,068 for Tokyo is a "metropolitan area" according to the UN. The lead is based on UN definitions, and the UN did implement those three definition into their ranking list. Also, "City proper" definition is necessary IMO because our readers need to know which administrative borders we refer to. For example, City of Tokyo and Tokyo Prefecture are different, so are City of London (with a lord mayor) vs Greater London (with a mayor). This table below is an alternative format, but not every country has an official data of "urban area". Bluesatellite (talk) 04:28, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The terminology used by the UN is "Population size and ranking of urban agglomerations with more than 5 million inhabitants". So the "urban agglomeration" title is correct based on using this list. UN World Urbanization Prospects is an authority that can define terms. If you think the UN made a mistake in this document, you need to provide a source saying this explicitly. In fact the UN labels the urban agglomeration file list of "largest cities", which is exactly the title of this page! It can't just be that "Bluesatellite doesn't like the term UN uses for largest cities", it has to come from a source. If you want to keep the city proper column, we can compromise on that. Unless you have a source saying the UN is wrong, I don't think there is any reason to not include this column, is there? We also need a source for the scope of this page. The UN also has a defined scope (81 cities/urban agglomerations over 5 million people) which we can source, compared to "Blue Satellite thinks the list should stop at 6 million people, and 10 million city proper so we don't have too many Chinese cities", which needless to say, is unsourced. Mattximus (talk) 13:43, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Using national statistics in this example does not work because not every jurisdiction reports those numbers for urban area, mostly just China, but like Amakuru said, we do need a tertiary source that can compare apples to apples and the UN did just that. Also the demographia *needs* the area column, because it's absolutely insane (Baltimore is part of Washington DC???). So if we keep demographia, we absolutely need those notes to clarify where the figure comes from. Mattximus (talk) 13:51, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

The following includes Bluesatellite's desire to include demographia data, and a column for the local definition of city proper. If this doesn't satisfy him, I honestly don't know what will. Mattximus (talk) 14:03, 16 April 2020 (UTC)


 * I added this new format to the main page, I have not removed a single "blue satellite approved" column, I've only added (and appropriately sourced), so I don't think there is a need for his automatic revert this time. Mattximus (talk) 16:22, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
 * During a dispute, you should first try to discuss controversial changes and seek consensus, why is it so hard for you to wait for others to comment before taking an action? I bold it, so you can read. The previous consensus agreed to sort based on "Urban area". The UN is not an urban area, it's a mixture of city proper, metropolitan area, and urban agglomeration. Bluesatellite (talk) 00:22, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
 * That is why the UN source is the perfect one to sort by, it's a analysis by the UN determining the largest cities. Which is the title of this page. It is by far the best source that matches the content of the lead as well, and doesn't involve any of our opinions or original research. It's done already, and UN is a reputable source for statistics. If you have a source saying the UN data is wrong and should not be used, by all means bring it into this discussion. Mattximus (talk) 02:34, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Summon previous commenters, , . Bluesatellite (talk) 00:34, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia works by making changes, not waiting for you to approve them *before they are made*. If others think this is a bad change then we can revert. You are not the king of the page, others can make changes, especially if sourced. I think this is a good change, and at the least I didn't delete anything, I only added. Let's see if others think this column and the scope should be deleted, or kept. Please don't break the 3RR rule again. Also, I think you are not being collaborative and working in good faith, I left all the columns you personally wanted included, so as to avoid you automatically reverting... and you reverted. Mattximus (talk) 02:30, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
 * But you change the order as well, based on your own will. You always accuse me of ownership, but you don't get ANY approves from other editors for that major change. You're the one who is not willing to wait for consensus. Per WP:CONSENSUS: When agreement cannot be reached through editing alone, the consensus-forming process becomes more explicit: editors open a section on the associated talk page and try to work out the dispute through discussion. Bluesatellite (talk) 02:58, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately in linked document UN is mixing different concepts in one table (per methodology "United Nations mostly relies on data from national sources, ... reflecting varying definitions and criteria established by national authorities both for the level of urbanization, expressed as the percentage urban, and for the population size of cities". I do not see any added value in adding that or even making that main source of the list. Jklamo (talk) 12:35, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

I think I see the problem. By you instantly reverting every change you are not letting anyone see the change and comment. Remember only a small few monitor talk pages, so by being the king of the page and reverting instantly you prevent people from viewing the main page and commenting on the talk page. Why not let this new column and order sit for a while until we have a few opinions other than yours and mine? What’s the harm waiting a while for more input? That’s what consensus is. The page will be better for it if more people get to see these changes. Mattximus (talk) 03:14, 17 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Also, you reverted again. One more revert and that will break the WP:3RR for a *third* time on this page, I will have to report again. Mattximus (talk) 03:18, 17 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Sorry I was offline for a few days and missed this drama. I think the current version of the list is a sensible compromise. Although we may question the methodology of the United Nations in assembling their list, at least it is a verifiable list from a reputable source, so including it where it is now seems OK, and gets around the issue of it replacing Dekographias populations, which are currently the best fit we have for "urban area" population. Let's keep it the way it is now, unless and until better sources come along, and we can move on. Thanks &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 07:02, 21 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I think we should never have deleted the seperate articles for each defintion of city. And I see nothing wrong with defining Baltimore as part of DC which was used as an earlier example by Mattximus to try and show how flawed Demographia's data is. Just a quick look at satellite imagery and there is clear continuous urbanisation between the centres of both cities. Eopsid (talk) 09:28, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

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London and others
There is a problem with the 'City Proper' column. The City of London has an area of 1 square mile and a population of 9,000. (These figures are approximate - if I were to edit the article then I would use exact numbers and cite a reference.) The trouble is that the City is not the same as Greater London. Greater London is a conurbation and a Ceremonial County but it is not a city. I can only comment on London because that is one I know but I suspect that there are other cities around the World where the actual City is tiny.

I'm putting this up for discussion rather than making an edit because I honestly don't know if putting the correct figures for City of London would be helpful. (Sometimes the facts are less helpful than half truths.) Also I don't know how many other cities are similar. Please advise! OrewaTel (talk) 02:40, 12 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Greater London is not a city on paper, but it is still run as a single city. GL has both an elected Mayor and legislative Assembly that governs the entirety of GL. GL is not a conurbation either, as a conurbation is a collection of cities and towns that have no overarching government and are run differently from one another. All 32 London boroughs are equal in their importance and government. The City of Westminster and the 3 royal boroughs Within GL have no more privilege than Southwark or Camden. All London boroughs are divided and set based on population. City status in the United Kingdom is just a moniker bestowed upon the queen to local government areas based on tradition and it brings no special privileges. While the City of London is not a London borough and has its own police force, it is still an LGA of London and receives all other Greater London services.Bjoh249 (talk) 05:24, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

The Area of Lahore
According to citation 12 the area (km2) of Lahore should be 896 for its urban area. Instead what is currently given in the article under the Urban area (Demographia) column is the area of the City proper. Billmt (talk) 03:37, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

differences between metropolitan and urban areas in data doesn't seem like it can make any sense
In many of the entries, the area listed for the urban area is much smaller than the metropolitan area, from a scale of like half to only 1/10 as many square kilometres, but then give a population value that is quite close, sometimes somewhat less, other times slightly more. This doesn't seem possible unless the areas included in metropolitan area but not urban area are vast stretches of mostly unpopulated areas around the city, but parts of the urban area are not a part of the metropolitan area. Clearly there is something wrong with how this data was compiled and is being interpreted before compared, possibly due to them being from different sources that describe things very differently. As it is, someone clearly made some serious errors while putting the data for much of this list together, though it would take quite some investigating to figure out what exactly is wrong.--108.86.120.155 (talk) 09:25, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

Hong Kong
Please remove Hong Kong from this list. It is a "special administrative region" of the People's Republic of China so it is not a city per se and no constitutional nor statutory provisions of the PRC regarding the definition of cities applies there. As far as the territorial laws are concerned, only Victoria City is defined to be a city. With less than a million people within its boundaries it would hardly find its way to this list. 125.59.140.243 22:15, 15 December 2020 (UTC)
 * It appears we are just reflecting the list from the UN, which includes Hong Kong – Thjarkur (talk) 22:28, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

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Chongqing
Chongqing isn't such a big city. What they called municipality of Chongqing is a region as big as Austria. There are plenty of cities in it. So to rank Chongqing as number one with a city proper of 30 millions inhabitants isn't relevant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cayzel (talk • contribs) 05:50, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I've always wondered if this is a Wikipedia assumption not borne out by the facts, or a translation error assuming that because 'shi' is translated as city in some cases it should be in the case of a province-equivalent political unit. Do Chinese people even consider the Chongqing Municipality to be a 'city proper'? Or do they just regard it as another province? How does the Chinese language Wikipedia deal with it? ҉ Randwicked ҉ 12:50, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

Please
Can we add more cities with all reliable sources. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.248.41.130 (talk) 20:06, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Small is beautiful... and it's also part of the 'sum of all human knowledge'!
It would be so good to also have a List of smallest cities and also a List of all capital cities. Llywelyn2000 (talk) 07:41, 6 April 2021 (UTC)


 * There's a List of national capitals by population. Keep in mind that list is comparing apples, oranges, pears and tennis balls when it comes to what constitutes a 'city'. As for a list of smallest cities, I'm not really sure how that would work. ҉ Randwicked ҉ 11:18, 6 April 2021 (UTC)


 * Thanks . That's the one! Yes, wars start over less, I'm sure! List of smallest cities (by pop) could be generated with Wikipedia lists (Magnus' listeria tool). But articles based only on biggest... imho should also a similar have smallest... the equilibrium of life! Llywelyn2000 (talk) 15:09, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Cities Proper List
The cities proper list is arguably the most significant ranking here (outside of economic data), and this list of cities proper figures always includes a number of metropolitan figures instead (Chongqing, Tokyo, etc.) that over exaggerate the city proper number. I realize an unavoidable problem is the outdated censuses for Delhi and Mumbai, which must be up to the 3rd and 4th most populated cities proper by now with 20+ million people, but we need to try to stick with the identified columns' grouping, particularly in the city proper column. --JLavigne508 (talk) 16:06, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * City proper's as problematic a comparison between cities as urban area or metropolitan area are, perhaps more, because they can vary so much. All comparing cities proper does is show that different countries structure their municipal governance in wildly varying ways, from the City of London at one end of the scale to Chongqing Municipality at the other. So I'd disagree it's the most significant ranking, in fact it might be the least meaningful (if any of this has any meaning at all), but I agree that some of these figures aren't really cities proper, particularly Tokyo Prefecture. - ҉ Randwicked ҉ 10:23, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

Add a column to the table about coastal/lacustrine/river to show that 60% of the biggest cities in the world can be affected by sea level rise
Urban area (Demographia) Pimajor (talk) 08:28, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 10:50, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 2 May 2021
Hi, I have made an edit request 2 weeks ago which BHG (BrownHairedGirl) has improved the edit. I would like to know how I can move the article edit out of the sandbox myself, or contact the editors of the page. Who are they by the way? Pimajor (talk) 10:39, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
 * The change has not been implemented yet, the change appears to add a "Coastal or Lacustrine" row to List of largest cities (I'm not commenting on the change just the other questions).
 * It would not be advisable to move the whole sandbox to the article, since the categories have been disabled (by BHG) and the protection template was removed by a bot.
 * This talk page is the way to contact regular editors of this page. This xtools page can be used to find frequent editors of this page.
 * You will be able to edit this page if you do 1 more edit.
 * Hope that helps. Terasail &#91;✉&#93; 01:02, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: Direction given by . &mdash;  LeoFrank   Talk 03:45, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

List of most populous cities missing Ankara
Ankara, Turkey seems to be missing in the list with a population of 5.663 million people. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.107.1.120 (talk) 00:59, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

Incorrect/misleading sizes for Madrid and Barcelona
The listed sizes of Madrid and Barcelona of 6.5 and 5.5 million seem inaccurate, and are probably referring to the size of the whole province. The actual size of the cities (municipalities as the table claims to be representing) is closer to 3 million for Madrid and 1.6 million for Barcelona. —Cousteau (talk) 15:12, 23 June 2021 (UTC)


 * Hi,
 * We're using the data from the sources. If you think the sources are wrong you can maybe contact them. But the figures seem correct. For instance, regarding Madrid, the Wikipedia article about the city says in the infobox:
 * "Population (2018)[4]
 * • Capital city and Municipality	3,223,334
 * • Rank	1st (2nd in EU)
 * • Density	5,300/km2 (14,000/sq mi)
 * • Urban	6,345,000 (2,019)[3]
 * • Metro	6,791,667 (2,018)[2]"
 * And each figure is correctly sourced. I think it's all about the difference between the definitions of city proper, the urban area and the metropolitan area, the last two ones are often, in practice, as you noticed, equal to the whole province or region. A455bcd9 (talk) 16:02, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

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Semi-protected edit request on 1 August 2021
change "New York" to "New York City" EnzoTC (talk) 20:24, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: While it is often called "New York City", that is only useful when it needs to be distinguished from the state; and here that is clearly not the case, and I don't see a reason to change this (the city is still very frequently referred to as simply "New York") RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 23:21, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 August 2021
Populations are not correct. See table. Michaelgrader (talk) 20:46, 30 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 21:06, 30 August 2021 (UTC)

San Francisco
Can someone please remove San Francisco from this list ? It's a joke, right ? There's not even a million people in SF, yet it's listed as 6 million ? Quick reference for whoever can do this,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco

While San Francisco itself has less than one million people, the metropolitan area which includes Fremont, Oakland, San Jose, Sunnyvale, and Berkeley, may have over 8 million depending on how you define the bay area. 99.6.253.145 (talk) 04:05, 3 September 2021 (UTC)Michael Ly

Semi-protected edit request on 10 September 2021
Add Monterrey, Mexico metropolitan area to the list. Mexico recently updated population estimates based on 2020 census and Monterrey surpassed Guadalajara Metro (which is in the list) as Mexico's 2nd largest metro.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_areas_of_Mexico for reference. Federicogarza (talk) 12:20, 10 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. WP:Wikipedia is not a reliable source. Please take the time to look for the exact reference given so that it can be verified more easily here. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 20:03, 10 September 2021 (UTC)

Wrong population graphs
You Salandarianflag (talk) 07:31, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Make the population confusing you count new yours metro population but not London if you counted London’s as well it would be much higher on the list. Salandarianflag (talk) 07:32, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Make the population confusing you count new yours metro population but not London if you counted London’s as well it would be much higher on the list. Salandarianflag (talk) 07:32, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Singapore's figures
Is there any particular reason why Singapore is having a "city proper" figure smaller than the UN 2018 estimate and an even smaller "urban area" figure? 219.76.24.207 (talk) 12:42, 4 November 2021 (UTC)
 * And for Hong Kong's figures, a bigger urban population than "city proper"? As far as I remember most of their territories are not considered urban. There's probably bit of non-urban population within their "city proper". Meanwhile why is the UN estimates somewhere in between? So some people living within their borders aren't recognised by the UN? 219.76.24.213 (talk) 11:26, 7 November 2021 (UTC)

World Bank report - Pearl River Delta the largest urban area?
It seems curious that the Pearl River Delta is not listed in this article yet, given this World Bank report, this Guardian report and this World Bank statement which show that the Pearl River Delta urban area is the most populous, and geographically largest, in the world (~42 million in 2010). Wantok (toktok) Wantok (toktok) 04:19, 29 December 2021 (UTC)

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New York
New York's total area can not be 34,493 m2 Please check it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.188.192.110 (talk) 09:14, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia contradicts itself on the population of NYC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_New_York — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:5C2:1:FF80:5C18:7F95:9C:7145 (talk) 19:12, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

Missing cities and UN source
The list of cities completely misses the Ruhr. Germany's largest urban area and over the 5 million limit that the UN source uses. Should we be using the UN source at all? This article even mentions its massive flaws: "The UN figures are a mixture of city proper, metropolitan area, and urban area. Several cities such as Jakarta and Seoul have significantly larger metropolitan/urban population figures which are excluded in the UN data." I propose completely getting rid of the UN source and associated column. We have the other sources so it shouldnt effect the article too much. And then add any cities/urban areas which are listed in the Demographia source which have populations over 5 million. Other than the Ruhr I dont think there are that many missing. Eopsid (talk) 22:22, 26 February 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 March 2022
These numbers are inflated. Phoenix is missing from this list and has a population smaller than Houston but greater than Dallas. Both of those cities have populations smaller than what is claimed here. It is in direct conflict of what is represented here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population 2600:8800:1C97:6400:C78:AF52:F74E:84EF (talk) 22:24, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
 * ❌ The cities included on this list are counted as agglomerations that meet the 5 million+ mark. Per the data included in these cited page sources ( and ), Phoenix (i.e. Phoenix, Avondale, Buckeye) has not yet reached that mark. If you could please provide reliable sources supporting the addition of Phoenix to this list, I or another editor will be happy to review. Thanks, Heartmusic678 (talk) 13:59, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

This list needs to be updated
This list would need to be updated with the 2021 estimates. Please look up the 2021 estimates of the world metro populations, and see what cities newly have over 5 million people. 23.150.224.32 (talk) 14:25, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

According to the list, 38 countries have a city with over 5 million people. I am trying to find out what new countries have a city with populations of over 5 million. 23.150.224.32 (talk) 14:28, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

Hi I was expecting to find Sydney here. Sydney and Melbourne, according to Wikipedia, have populations over 5 million. Tooeleman (talk) 05:32, 16 April 2022 (UTC)


 * Definitely needs updating:
 * Sydney:
 * -Urban 4,959,107
 * -Metro 5,361,466
 * -City Proper 242,237
 * Melbourne
 * -Urban 4,901,863
 * -Metro 5,096,298
 * -City Proper 169,860
 * Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics 2021
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_Australia_by_population Fabrisiq (talk) 11:21, 20 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Note that UN source is from 2018, which isn't that long. We are not aware of a comparable single source with equal reliability (see discussions in archive). We're not going to change the source just because one or more cites didn't make it to the list.--Jklamo (talk) 12:42, 21 April 2022 (UTC)
 * The source for urban areas is http://www.demographia.com/db-worldua.pdf which is from June 2021. It'll be updated in June 2022. So not that long either. A455bcd9 (talk) 20:32, 21 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Currently this list only shows cities in the world over 5 million. When this list will be updated, will it show a list of all the cities in the world with populations over 1 million? Could we possibly do that? 23.150.224.58 (talk) 17:29, 16 May 2022 (UTC)
 * If other WP:RS publish estimates different from the UN, they be represented in the article; it's not up to editors to decide. It's WP:POLICY. All there is for us, editors, to discuss is  best to apply WP:POLICY in representing them. — Guarapiranga ☎ 04:34, 17 May 2022 (UTC)

Missing in the list
The Cities missing in the list that I have found until now are Hanoi, Vietnam (8,426,500 capital city and 19,795,895 metro according to the article about it) and Caracas, Venezuela (5.645.566 metro according to the spanish article, updated 2021) Propanolol (talk) 10:32, 13 July 2022 (UTC)


 * The previous discussions that I can see suggest with sources that even Sydney, Melbourne, Berlin and the Ruhr have over 5 milions inhabitants, I agree too to get rid of the column in favour of more updated ones or at least to add informations from the other sources keeping that one. Propanolol (talk) 11:27, 13 July 2022 (UTC)
 * More data from the related articles: 1) Shanghai 41,354,149 metro (more than Tokyo); 2) Ankara 5,747,325 metro; 3) Abidjan 5,381,826 urban; 4) Busan 7,000,699 metro; 5) Nairobi 10,400,676 metro Propanolol (talk) 12:31, 13 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep it, and scrap the +5M 2018 UN cutoff in favour of a top 100 one.
 * I see your account is new, . If you're a new editor, please feel free to add the data you found. If other editors disagree, they'll revert your changes, and we can discuss it here (this is how WP rolls). — Guarapiranga ☎ 02:56, 14 July 2022 (UTC)
 * The page is semi-protected so even if I knew exactly what to do not to get brutally reverted I can't actually do that. Propanolol (talk) 21:24, 14 July 2022 (UTC)
 * A lot in the incipit is about Tokyo being the urban agglomerate and the metropolitan city with most inhabitants in the world, according to the data from the census of Shanghai that part should be edited too. Propanolol (talk) 21:32, 14 July 2022 (UTC)
 * A lot in the incipit is about Tokyo being the urban agglomerate and the metropolitan city with most inhabitants in the world, according to the data from the census of Shanghai that part should be edited too. Propanolol (talk) 21:32, 14 July 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 27 June 2022
This list needs to be updated. In 81st is not suppost to be Guadalajara, but Monterrey according to the spanish version of the list (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anexo:Aglomeraciones_urbanas_m%C3%A1s_pobladas_del_mundo). Why does this list only get to 81st place? Why not 100? Lizlarraga (talk) 16:39, 27 June 2022 (UTC)
 * ❌ - Wikipedias are not WP:Reliable sources whatever language they are in - as for the list length, it is restricted to populations over 5 Million - Arjayay (talk) 16:44, 27 June 2022 (UTC)
 * No reason why that couldn't be changed—from 5 million to top 100—as that's more like to be a stable criterion, as cities continue to grow (and the number of cities over 5 million pop bound to cross the top 100 threshold). — Guarapiranga ☎ 23:42, 27 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Top 100 may be a criterion, but a totally arbitrary criterion. Population based threshold is much less arbitrary. Jklamo (talk) 15:14, 15 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Do you an RS for a non-arbitrary pop threshold, ? — Guarapiranga ☎ 05:42, 16 July 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 26 July 2022
81.103.145.160 (talk) 10:40, 26 July 2022 (UTC) US cities are listed in metropolitan status while others are not, for example NYC is listed as 18 million which is its metropolitan population while London is listed by its urban population of 9 Million, if London were to be measured like New York it would have a population of 14.5 Million. Also Sydney and Melbourne which have populations of 5.3 and 5.1 million respectively should also be on the list.


 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Also, please provide sources for the populations of Sydney and Melbourne. Of the universe (talk) 15:15, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 11 August 2022
In the list, change Definition from "Municipality" to "Municipal Corporation" for Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Surat and Pune. Sreenandan C K (talk) 06:36, 11 August 2022 (UTC)
 * ✅ — Sirdog (talk) 16:13, 11 August 2022 (UTC)