Brazil has 15 cities with more than 1 million inhabitants. These municipalities are home to 42.8 million people, representing 20.1% of the Brazilian population, or one in every five inhabitants. Of the 15 cities, only two are not capitals: Guarulhos and Campinas, in São Paulo.
The data comes from the population estimate as of July 1, 2025, released on Thursday (28) by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE).
The institute revealed that the country reached 213.4 million people, a 0.39% growth in one year.
São Paulo capital is the largest city in the country, with 11.9 million inhabitants. If it were a state, the city would be the fourth most populous, behind only São Paulo, Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro, and Bahia.
In the list of the fifteen largest cities in the country, two from São Paulo make the ranking even though they are not capitals: Guarulhos and Campinas.
Brazilian cities with more than 1 million people:
• São Paulo: 11.9 million
• Rio de Janeiro: 6.7 million
• Brasília: 3.0 million
• Fortaleza: 2.6 million
• Salvador: 2.6 million
• Belo Horizonte: 2.4 million
• Manaus: 2.3 million
• Curitiba: 1.8 million
• Recife: 1.6 million
• Goiânia: 1.5 million
• Belém: 1.4 million
• Porto Alegre: 1.4 million
• Guarulhos (SP): 1.3 million
• Campinas (SP): 1.2 million
• São Luís: 1.1 million
Although the Brazilian population grew from one year to the next, the institute notes that five capitals lost population from 2024 to 2025:
• Salvador (0.18%);
• Belo Horizonte (0.02%);
• Belém (0.09%);
• Porto Alegre (0.04%) and
• Natal (0.14%), which with 784.2 thousand inhabitants does not make it into the list of the 15 most populous cities.
The manager of Studies and Analyses of Demographic Dynamics at IBGE, Marcio Minamiguchi, explains that the population decline is related to the interconnection with neighboring cities.
“The larger capitals, these more central municipalities, generally have more conurbated surroundings and lose population to them. Growth goes from the center to the periphery. Among the capitals that lost population, with the exception of Salvador, there was an increase in inhabitants in the respective metropolitan region,” he points out.
According to IBGE, Brazil has 30 metropolitan regions, which concentrate 103.5 million people, or 48.5% of the population.
The largest are São Paulo’s (21.6 million inhabitants), Rio de Janeiro’s (12.9 million), and Belo Horizonte’s (6 million).
Smallest cities
Brazil has 26 cities with fewer than 1,500 inhabitants. Four have fewer than 1,000 residents:
• Serra da Saudade (MG): 856
• Anhanguera (GO): 913
• Borá (SP): 932
• Araguainha (MT): 997
For comparison, the Airbus A350-1000 airplane accommodates 375 to 400 passengers.
Fund
The disclosure of the population estimate by IBGE is a legal requirement and serves for the Federal Court of Accounts (TCU) to calculate values for the Participation Fund for States and Municipalities, which are resources transferred from the Union to the other federative entities.
To arrive at the population estimate, IBGE starts from the last census conducted in 2022 and makes annual projections based on data such as mortality and birth rates.
According to the institute, the Brazilian population will continue on a growth trajectory until 2041, reaching 220.43 million inhabitants, then begin to shrink starting in 2042. In 2070, the country is expected to have 199.2 million people.