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Data

Urban population

UN national definitions, HYDE

What you should know about this indicator

  • From 1950 onward, this indicator uses the UN World Urbanization Prospects, based on each country's own definition of urban areas. For earlier years, it draws on HYDE v3.3 (History Database of the Global Environment), a modelled reconstruction of historical settlement patterns.
  • Countries define "urban" differently — some use a population threshold, others use density, administrative status, or the type of work people do. This makes these figures most useful for tracking change within a single country over time. Cross-country comparisons should be treated with caution.
  • The UN now publishes these national-definitions estimates mainly for continuity with earlier statistics. For cross-country comparisons, a better choice is the Degree of Urbanization (DEGURBA) framework, which applies the same density and settlement-size thresholds everywhere. Our charts using DEGURBA data use this harmonized standard.
Urban population
UN national definitions, HYDE
Number of people living in urban areas, combining UN estimates from 1950 with modelled historical data back to 10,000 BCE.
Source
HYDE (2023); United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Last updated
February 17, 2026
Next expected update
February 2031
Date range
10000 BCE – 2025 CE
Unit
people

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency – History Database of the Global Environment

This database presents an update and expansion of the History Database of the Global Environment (HYDE, v 3.3) and replaces former HYDE 3.2 version from 2017. HYDE is and internally consistent combination of updated historical population estimates and land use. Categories include cropland, with a new distinction into irrigated and rain fed crops (other than rice) and irrigated and rain fed rice. Also grazing lands are provided, divided into more intensively used pasture, converted rangeland and non-converted natural (less intensively used) rangeland. Population is represented by maps of total, urban, rural population and population density as well as built-up area. The period covered is 10 000 BCE to 2023 CE. Spatial resolution is 5 arc minutes (approx. 85 km2 at the equator), the files are in ESRI ASCII grid format.

Retrieved on
January 2, 2024
Retrieved from
https://doi.org/10.24416/UU01-AEZZIT
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Utrecht University/PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency - History Database of the Global Environment (HYDE v 3.3, 2023).
Klein Goldewijk, C.G.M., Beusen, A., Doelman, J., Stehfest, E., 2017, Anthropogenic land use estimates for the Holocene – HYDE 3.2, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 9, 927–953

This database presents an update and expansion of the History Database of the Global Environment (HYDE, v 3.3) and replaces former HYDE 3.2 version from 2017. HYDE is and internally consistent combination of updated historical population estimates and land use. Categories include cropland, with a new distinction into irrigated and rain fed crops (other than rice) and irrigated and rain fed rice. Also grazing lands are provided, divided into more intensively used pasture, converted rangeland and non-converted natural (less intensively used) rangeland. Population is represented by maps of total, urban, rural population and population density as well as built-up area. The period covered is 10 000 BCE to 2023 CE. Spatial resolution is 5 arc minutes (approx. 85 km2 at the equator), the files are in ESRI ASCII grid format.

Retrieved on
January 2, 2024
Retrieved from
https://doi.org/10.24416/UU01-AEZZIT
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Utrecht University/PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency - History Database of the Global Environment (HYDE v 3.3, 2023).
Klein Goldewijk, C.G.M., Beusen, A., Doelman, J., Stehfest, E., 2017, Anthropogenic land use estimates for the Holocene – HYDE 3.2, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 9, 927–953

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division – World Urbanization Prospects 2025 - Urban and Rural Population by National Definition

Population estimates and projections for urban and rural areas based on national definitions of urban areas. The dataset provides population data in thousands at mid-year by region, subregion, country and area from 1950 to 2050.

National definitions of "urban" vary considerably from country to country. Criteria such as population size, population density, type of economic activity, physical characteristics, level of infrastructure, or a combination of these may be used to define urban areas.

Retrieved on
February 17, 2026
Retrieved from
https://population.un.org/wup/
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2025). World Urbanization Prospects: The 2025 Revision, Online Edition. POP/DB/WUP/Rev.2025/F14

Population estimates and projections for urban and rural areas based on national definitions of urban areas. The dataset provides population data in thousands at mid-year by region, subregion, country and area from 1950 to 2050.

National definitions of "urban" vary considerably from country to country. Criteria such as population size, population density, type of economic activity, physical characteristics, level of infrastructure, or a combination of these may be used to define urban areas.

Retrieved on
February 17, 2026
Retrieved from
https://population.un.org/wup/
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2025). World Urbanization Prospects: The 2025 Revision, Online Edition. POP/DB/WUP/Rev.2025/F14

How we process data at Our World in Data

All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.

At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.

Read about our data pipeline
Notes on our processing step for this indicator

We combined two sources to extend the urban population series as far back as possible. For years before 1950, we use urban population estimates from HYDE v3.3. From 1950 onward, we use urban population from the UN World Urbanization Prospects based on each country's national definition. The UN source reports population in thousands; we converted to people to align with HYDE.

Reuse this work

  • All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
  • All data, visualizations, and code produced by Our World in Data are completely open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have the permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited.

Citations

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Urban population”, part of the following publication: Hannah Ritchie, Veronika Samborska, and Max Roser (2024) - “Urbanization”. Data adapted from PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. Retrieved from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260605-100901/grapher/urban-and-rural-population-stacked.html [online resource] (archived on June 5, 2026).

How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

HYDE (2023); United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data

Full citation

HYDE (2023); United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data. “Urban population – UN national definitions, HYDE” [dataset]. PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, “History Database of the Global Environment 3.3”; United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division, “World Urbanization Prospects 2025 - Urban and Rural Population by National Definition” [original data]. Retrieved June 5, 2026 from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260605-100901/grapher/urban-and-rural-population-stacked.html (archived on June 5, 2026).

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