How many people live in London?
Guess before you scroll — the answer is below
The answer
8,900,000 people
Roughly 8.9M.
Greater London has about 8.9 million residents. Over a third were born outside the UK, and more than 300 languages are spoken in its schools — the most linguistically diverse city on Earth by that measure.
How to get close to this number
Anchor on other European capitals and adjust upward. The largest western European cities run from three to six million in their administrative boundaries, and this is the largest of them. Somewhere approaching nine million is the right answer for the wider administrative area.
The boundary question matters more here than almost anywhere. The figure describes the wider administrative region rather than the historic city, which has a few thousand residents, and the built-up urban area extends beyond even that. Three defensible answers to "how many people live in London" differ by a factor of a thousand depending on which London you mean.
The diversity figures in the explanation are the ones worth keeping: over a third born abroad and more than three hundred languages spoken in its schools. By that second measure it is the most linguistically diverse city on Earth — a statistic that describes the city better than any population total, and one that only exists because school systems record it.
Where this number comes from
| Source | Office for National Statistics |
|---|---|
| Figure refers to | 2023 |
| Last checked | |
| Unit | people |
Numbers move. If this one has drifted from its source, let us know.
Think you can do better?
Five fresh questions every day. No account needed.