Historical Metropolitan Populations of the United States The graph and tables on this page attempt to show how the urban hierarchy of the United States has developed over time. The statistic used here is the population of the metropolitan area (contiguous urbanized area surrounding a central city), not the population of an individual city. Metropolitan area population is much more useful than city population as an indicator of the size and importance of a city, since the official boundaries of a city are usually arbitrary and often do not include vast suburban areas. For example, in 2000 San Antonio was the 10th largest city in the U.S., larger than Boston or San Francisco, but its Metro Area was only ranked about 30th. The same thing was happening even back in 1790: New York was the biggest single city, but Philadelphia plus its suburbs of Northern Liberties and Southwark made it the biggest metro area. Skip to the Data Tables

Peak Year for Declining Cities

Methodology and Sources Graph of Metro Area Population Rank over Time The top 20 Metro Areas in the United States, 1790-2010 Notes on graph: See tables below for help on what the various metro area codes mean--most are fairly self-explanatory. For example "NY" is New York, "Chi" is Chicago, and so on. Also note that the table graphs rank, not population. A metro area can see increasing population and decreasing rank at the same time, if other metro areas are growing faster. Indeed, I think very few metro areas have lost population during any 10 year span. Random Notes and Comments The urban hierarchy of the U.S. was dominated by the Northeast and Midwest until relatively recently. Between 1840 and 1900, 18 out of the top 20 metro areas were in the northeastern quadrant of the current USA, with just New Orleans, plus either Charleston or San Francisco, as the only cities in the South or West. As late as 1960, 15 out of 20 were still outside the "sunbelt".

For 80 years, from 1860 to 1930 inclusive, New Orleans was the only southern city in the top 20. Before that, Charleston, SC was the dominant city of the south, falling off the list in 1850. In 1940, Houston, Dallas, and Miami began their rises, and Atlanta didn't crack the top 20 until 1970.

Cincinnati was the first major city of the Midwest, making the top 20 list in 1820. By 1890 there were 9 midwestern cities in the top 20.

San Francisco was the only western city in the top 20 for 50 years, from 1860 to 1900 inclusive. By 1910 Los Angeles cracked the the top 20, soon overtaking its northern rival. In 2010, the West had more cities on the list (6) than any other region.

In 1850, 5 of the top 20 cities were in New York State: New York City (1), Albany (7), Buffalo (10), Rochester (16), and Syracuse (18). The nickname "Empire State" was very apt in the heyday of the Erie Canal.

Four northeastern cities (New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Baltimore) have been in the top 20 since the first census in 1790. Washington, DC didn't really exist in 1790, but Alexandria, VA was on the list then, and DC itself afterwards, so one could argue that the Washington metro area also has been in the top 20 since independence.

By 1930 Washington, DC was ranked #17, down from #5 in 1820. But the expansion of the federal government during the New Deal era and World War II propelled it up to #8 by 1970. It is the only metro area with a U-shaped curve, with a steady decline in rank followed by a steady rise. Tables: Top 20 U.S. Metropolitan Areas by Population, 1790-2010

(with top 4 Metropolitan Areas 1680-1775) Approximate Populations in Thousands See the section below on Methodology and Sources for more information as to where these numbers came from. 1680 Rank City Pop 1. Boston 4.5 2. New York 3.0 3. Newport, RI 2.5 4. Charleston 0.7 1700 Rank City Pop 1. Boston 6.7 2. New York 5.0 3. Philadelphia 5.0 4. Newport, RI 2.6 1720 Rank City Pop 1. Boston 12 2. Philadelphia 10 3. New York 7 4. Newport, RI 3.8 1740 Rank City Pop 1. Boston 16.4 2. Philadelphia 13.0 3. New York 11.0 4. Charleston 6.8 1760 Rank City Pop 1. Philadelphia 23.8 2. New York 18.0 3. Boston 15.6 4. Charleston 8.0 1775 Rank City Pop 1. Philadelphia 40 2. New York 25 3. Boston 16 4. Charleston 12 1790 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. Philadelphia 44.1 2. New York 33.1 3. Boston 18.3 4. Charleston 16.4 5. Salem, MA 13.6 6. Baltimore 13.5 7. Newport, RI 6.7 8. Providence 6.4 9. Gloucester, MA 5.3 10. Newburyport, MA 4.8 11. Portsmouth, NH 4.7 12. Nantucket 4.6 13. Middleborough, MA 4.5 14. New Haven 4.5 15. Richmond 3.8 16. Albany 3.5 17. Norfolk 3.0 18. Petersburg, VA 2.8 19. Alexandria, VA 2.8 20. Hartford 2.7 1800 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. Philadelphia 61.6 2. New York 60.5 3. Baltimore 26.5 4. Boston 24.9 5. Charleston 18.8 6. Salem, MA 14.7 7. Washington 11.2 8. Providence 7.6 9. Norfolk 6.9 10. Newport, RI 6.7 11. Newburyport, MA 6.0 12. Richmond 5.7 13. Nantucket 5.6 14. Portsmouth, NH 5.3 15. Gloucester, MA 5.3 16. Schenectady, NY 5.3 17. Albany 5.3 18. New London, CT 5.2 19. Savannah 5.2 20. Middleborough, MA 4.5 1810 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 101 2. Philadelphia 87.3 3. Baltimore 46.6 4. Boston 38.7 5. Charleston 24.7 6. Salem, MA 23.1 7. Washington 20.4 8. New Orleans 17.2 9. Albany 10.8 10. Providence 10.1 11. Richmond 9.7 12. Norfolk 9.2 13. Newport, RI 7.9 14. Newburyport, MA 7.6 15. Portland, ME 7.2 16. Portsmouth, NH 6.9 17. Nantucket 6.8 18. Gloucester, MA 5.9 19. Schenectady, NY 5.9 20. New Haven 5.8 1820 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 131 2. Philadelphia 109 3. Baltimore 62.7 4. Boston 54.0 5. Washington 28.8 6. New Orleans 27.2 7. Charleston 24.8 8. Salem, MA 22.6 9. Albany 17.9 10. Richmond 12.1 11. Providence 11.8 12. Cincinnati 9.6 13. Portland, ME 8.6 14. Norfolk 8.5 15. Savannah 7.5 16. Portsmouth, NH 7.3 17. Newport, RI 7.3 18. Nantucket 7.3 19. Pittsburgh 7.3 20. New Haven 7.2 1830 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 215 2. Philadelphia 161 3. Boston 85.6 4. Baltimore 80.6 5. New Orleans 46.1 6. Albany 35.8 7. Washington 35.5 8. Charleston 30.3 9. Salem, MA 27.3 10. Cincinnati 24.8 11. Providence 22.4 12. Richmond 16.1 13. Pittsburgh 15.4 14. Newark 14.4 15. Portland, ME 12.6 16. Louisville 10.3 17. New Haven 10.2 18. Norfolk 9.8 19. Rochester 9.2 20. Buffalo 8.7 1840 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 374 2. Philadelphia 259 3. Boston 183 4. Baltimore 110 5. New Orleans 105 6. Albany 72.0 7. Cincinnati 54.8 8. Washington 50.2 9. Pittsburgh 43.7 10. Charleston 42.6 11. Providence 40.9 12. Louisville 34.2 13. Rochester 31.4 14. Newark 29.8 15. Buffalo 29.3 16. Portland, ME 28.6 17. St. Louis 28.4 18. New Bedford 24.1 19. New Haven 21.9 20. Detroit 21.2 1850 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 650 2. Philadelphia 405 3. Boston 308 4. Baltimore 179 5. Cincinnati 133 6. New Orleans 123 7. Albany 107 8. St. Louis 95 9. Pittsburgh 86 10. Buffalo 80 11. Washington 67 12. Providence 65 13. Louisville 61 14. Newark 57 15. Charleston 50 16. Rochester 49 17. Chicago 40 18. Syracuse 38 19. Detroit 38 20. Portland, ME 36 1860 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 1143 2. Philadelphia 608 3. Boston 374 4. Baltimore 221 5. Cincinnati 192 6. St. Louis 176 7. New Orleans 172 8. Chicago 123 9. Albany 116 10. Newark 103 11. Pittsburgh 93 12. Buffalo 90 13. Louisville 88 14. Washington 80 15. Providence 69 16. Detroit 59 17. San Francisco 57 18. Rochester 56 19. Cleveland 49 20. Milwaukee 48 1870 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 1687 2. Philadelphia 747 3. Boston 501 4. St. Louis 345 5. Chicago 324 6. Baltimore 283 7. Cincinnati 257 8. New Orleans 196 9. Pittsburgh 170 10. Albany 157 11. San Francisco 151 12. Buffalo 133 13. Louisville 129 14. Washington 123 15. Providence 101 16. Detroit 101 17. Cleveland 101 18. Milwaukee 75 19. Rochester 73 20. New Haven 65 1880 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 2234 2. Philadelphia 949 3. Boston 658 4. Chicago 543 5. St. Louis 386 6. Baltimore 353 7. Cincinnati 307 8. Pittsburgh 265 9. San Francisco 236 10. New Orleans 219 11. Albany 178 12. Buffalo 171 13. Cleveland 169 14. Washington 164 15. Detroit 147 16. Louisville 143 17. Providence 128 18. Milwaukee 121 19. Rochester 103 20. Minneapolis 94 1890 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 2977 2. Philadelphia 1180 3. Chicago 1141 4. Boston 818 5. St. Louis 490 6. Baltimore 453 7. Pittsburgh 396 8. Cincinnati 344 9. Minneapolis 305 10. San Francisco 302 11. Cleveland 274 12. Buffalo 272 13. Washington 253 14. New Orleans 245 15. Detroit 237 16. Milwaukee 212 17. Albany 189 18. Louisville 183 19. Kansas City 165 20. Providence 163 1900 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 4266 2. Chicago 1759 3. Philadelphia 1454 4. Boston 1009 5. St. Louis 626 6. Pittsburgh 532 7. Baltimore 532 8. Cleveland 396 9. Cincinnati 379 10. San Francisco 375 11. Minneapolis 374 12. Buffalo 373 13. Detroit 321 14. Washington 302 15. Milwaukee 296 16. New Orleans 291 17. Providence 243 18. Kansas City 242 19. Louisville 227 20. Albany 188 1910 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 6021 2. Chicago 2283 3. Philadelphia 1746 4. Boston 1213 5. St. Louis 760 6. Pittsburgh 655 7. San Francisco 604 8. Baltimore 589 9. Cleveland 580 10. Minneapolis 526 11. Detroit 503 12. Cincinnati 425 13. Buffalo 420 14. Milwaukee 389 15. Los Angeles 374 16. Kansas City 357 17. Washington 357 18. New Orleans 344 19. Albany 283 20. Providence 274 1920 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 7041 2. Chicago 2859 3. Philadelphia 2072 4. Boston 1366 5. Detroit 1071 6. St. Louis 859 7. Cleveland 834 8. Pittsburgh 775 9. San Francisco 771 10. Baltimore 753 11. Los Angeles 682 12. Minneapolis 626 13. Buffalo 539 14. Milwaukee 478 15. Cincinnati 470 16. Washington 467 17. Kansas City 455 18. New Orleans 393 19. Seattle 334 20. Indianapolis 323 1930 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 8667 2. Chicago 3718 3. Philadelphia 2264 4. Detroit 1721 5. Los Angeles 1617 6. Boston 1479 7. San Francisco 996 8. Cleveland 976 9. Pittsburgh 960 10. St. Louis 950 11. Baltimore 836 12. Minneapolis 753 13. Buffalo 620 14. Milwaukee 615 15. Cincinnati 580 16. Kansas City 561 17. Washington 527 18. New Orleans 469 19. Seattle 390 20. Indianapolis 379 1940 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 10135 2. Chicago 4210 3. Philadelphia 2538 4. Los Angeles 2268 5. Detroit 2041 6. Boston 1746 7. San Francisco 1156 8. Pittsburgh 1134 9. St. Louis 1102 10. Cleveland 1079 11. Baltimore 992 12. Minneapolis 886 13. Washington 800 14. Buffalo 708 15. Milwaukee 705 16. Kansas City 632 17. Cincinnati 559 18. New Orleans 557 19. Houston 471 20. Seattle 451 1950 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 12604 2. Chicago 5208 3. Los Angeles 4250 4. Philadelphia 3297 5. Detroit 2884 6. Boston 2301 7. San Francisco 2131 8. St. Louis 1541 9. Cleveland 1425 10. Pittsburgh 1400 11. Washington 1287 12. Baltimore 1162 13. Minneapolis 987 14. Buffalo 895 15. Dallas 855 16. Milwaukee 829 17. Cincinnati 813 18. Houston 701 19. Kansas City 698 20. New Orleans 660 1960 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 14437 2. Los Angeles 6805 3. Chicago 6377 4. Philadelphia 3989 5. Detroit 3750 6. San Francisco 2607 7. Boston 2501 8. Pittsburgh 2105 9. Washington 1905 10. St. Louis 1864 11. Cleveland 1785 12. Dallas 1435 13. Baltimore 1419 14. Minneapolis 1377 15. Miami 1173 16. Milwaukee 1150 17. Houston 1140 18. Buffalo 1054 19. Cincinnati 994 20. Kansas City 921 1970 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 16193 2. Los Angeles 7984 3. Chicago 7164 4. Philadelphia 4419 5. Detroit 4085 6. San Francisco 3049 7. Boston 2703 8. Washington 2671 9. Pittsburgh 2124 10. St. Louis 2123 11. Dallas 2016 12. Cleveland 1960 13. Miami 1834 14. Minneapolis 1701 15. Houston 1678 16. Baltimore 1580 17. Milwaukee 1252 18. Seattle 1238 19. San Diego 1198 20. Atlanta 1172 1980 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 16500 2. Los Angeles 10841 3. Chicago 7325 4. Philadelphia 4830 5. Detroit 4214 6. San Francisco 4185 7. Boston 3064 8. Washington 2912 9. Houston 2757 10. Dallas 2713 11. Miami 2616 12. St. Louis 1849 13. Pittsburgh 1810 14. Minneapolis 1788 15. Baltimore 1755 16. Cleveland 1752 17. San Diego 1704 18. Atlanta 1613 19. Phoenix 1409 20. Seattle 1392 1990 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 16754 2. Los Angeles 13522 3. Chicago 7373 4. San Francisco 5386 5. Philadelphia 4970 6. Miami 3948 7. Detroit 3698 8. Washington 3363 9. Boston 3355 10. Dallas 3265 11. Houston 3088 12. Seattle 2354 13. San Diego 2348 14. Atlanta 2158 15. Minneapolis 2080 16. Phoenix 2006 17. St. Louis 1947 18. Baltimore 1890 19. Pittsburgh 1744 20. Tampa 1709 2000 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 18689 2. Los Angeles 14661 3. Chicago 8419 4. San Francisco 5973 5. Philadelphia 5418 6. Miami 4919 7. Dallas 4445 8. Houston 4063 9. Boston 4032 10. Washington 3934 11. Detroit 3903 12. Atlanta 3500 13. Seattle 3018 14. Phoenix 2975 15. San Diego 2674 16. Minneapolis 2389 17. Baltimore 2251 18. Denver 2231 19. St. Louis 2078 20. Tampa 2062 2010 Rank Metro Area Pop 1. New York 20009 2. Los Angeles 15750 3. Chicago 9023 4. San Francisco 6828 5. Philadelphia 6003 6. Dallas 5685 7. Miami 5513 8. Houston 5382 9. Atlanta 4743 10. Washington 4697 11. Boston 4407 12. Detroit 4160 13. Phoenix 3863 14. Seattle 3446 15. San Diego 2985 16. Denver 2716 17. Minneapolis 2651 18. Baltimore 2497 19. Tampa 2442 20. St. Louis 2246 Peak Years for Cities that have Declined in Rank The following table of metro areas shows ones that have declined in rank and are not likely to ever reach their past high ranking again. If a metro area had its high ranking for more than one year, then the latest year is selected. Metro Area High Rank Year High Rank Boston 1740 1 Charleston 1790 4 Philadelphia 1800 1 Providence 1800 8 Norfolk 1800 9 Baltimore 1820 3 Richmond 1820 10 Portland, ME 1820 13 New Haven 1830 17 New Orleans 1840 5 Albany 1840 6 Metro Area High Rank Year High Rank Louisville 1840 12 Rochester 1840 13 Buffalo 1850 10 Cincinnati 1860 5 St. Louis 1870 4 Minneapolis 1890 9 Pittsburgh 1910 6 Cleveland 1920 7 Detroit 1930 4 Milwaukee 1930 14 Chicago 1950 2 If you live in any of these metro areas, it might be interesting to see when your home town was at it's peak--for example, if you now live in St. Louis, you can imagine a time (1870) when your city was the 4th most-populous urban center in the country. Of course, "not likely to reach past high ranking" does not mean impossbile, but I think most would agree that no one expects to see Charleston, SC as the 4th largest metro area in the US anytime soon. This list is sorted chronologically, and note that the first part of the list is dominated by East Coast cities, and the last part by metro areas in the Midwest. No cities in the West are on the list. Sunbelt metro areas have all been growing quickly in recent decades and at this point I don't think we can say that any have clearly peaked in their ranking. Methodology and Sources There is no consistent, long-standing, precise standard for metropolitan area definition in the United States. Prior to 1950, the U.S. census bureau didn't even have the concept. Since then, various kinds of metro areas (SMSAs, MSAs, CMSAs, etc.) have been defined by the federal OMB, but they are mostly based on entire counties and their definitions have fluctuated. More useful is the Urbanized Area, defined as contiguous land above a certain population density, but they, too, have only been tracked in the past few decades. Complicating matters is determining exactly where the metro area boundaries fall and what cities should be included. For example, I list Newark as the 10th largest city in the US in 1860, but in 1870 it is (somewhat arbitraily) included as part of the New York metro area, so it falls off the chart. Salem and Boston have a simliar pattern. In general, though, I have lumped together cities like Minneapolis-St. Paul, Dallas-Fort Worth, Miami-Fort Lauderdale, San Francisco-Oakland, and others. A large rise in population over a ten-year period could be attributed to a city "capturing" the urban are of a neighboring city during that time. Six main sources for population data were used: #1: Census Bureau: Population of the 100 Largest Cities in the United States 1790-1990

#2: Urbanized Area Populations 1950-2000 from Demographia.com

#3: County-by-County U.S. Census data 1790-2000

#4: Metropolitan Area and Urbanized Area U.S. Census data from 1950-2010

#5: Colonial Port City Populations (Burrows, City Univeristy of New York-Booklyn--website no longer available) for populations 1680-1775

#6: In about 1984 I found a book in the University of Pennsylvania library that had top 20 metro area rankings for the 1860-1980 period. I wrote down the rankings from that book, but was never able to find it again, and to this day I still have no idea of its title, author, source, or methodology. All I have is the notes I wrote down. Indeed, my search for this information led directly to the research I did here, in an attempt to replicate the data from the book. I first took all the city population data from source #1 and assigned suburban places to central cities, for example, Oakland to San Francisco or Newark to New York (as appropriate by year). Then I was able to get a total population of all cities (in the national top 100) for a metro area for a given year. For 1790 to 1830, there were fewer than 100 total cities in the nation, so these totals were used exclusively for those years in the charts above. For 1840 to 1940, I used the county data from source #3 and assigned counties to central cities (again, as appropriate by year), and to get a metro area population, I took the total of the cities listed in the top 100 and added a portion of the population in the surrounding counties. I used a figure ranging from about 25% in 1840 up to about 50% in 1940. This means that the 1900 population of the Cleveland metro area was obtained by taking the population of Cleveland and adding to it a percentage of the population of Cuyahoga county. For 1950-2010 I generally used urbanized area populations (source #2) as much as possible, doing some combinations of urbanized areas that the census bureau did not do (for example, San Jose added to the San Francisco-Oakland urbanized area). I checked this agains source #4, the metro area populations, for a sanity check. Once I had all this, I went through and "smoothed out" the numbers a bit to avoid jarring ups and downs in rank for certain cities. I also compared my rankings against source #6 noted above, and made sure my numbers were within 2 ranking spots of theirs, and, if not, adjusting accordingly. The Colonial Era top 4 lists were mainly from source #5 above, but cross-checked for sanity with other writings about early American cities. There are some population numbers that are widely quoted for New York, Boston, and Philadelphia that are clearly at odds with most sources, and they have been ignored. No attempt was made to add any suburban populations for the 1680-1775 period, so, for example, the 2000 people in Brooklyn in 1720 are not included in the New York population. At that time, the concept of a metropolitan area was simply not applicable, so simple city populations were used. The end results are, at best, educated wild guesses. This is not a serious academic reseach project and my methodology would not hold up to peer-review scrutiny. This means that no number above should be considered 100% accurate, and most city rankings are within plus or minus 2 slots, at best. There are simply too many judgement calls that went into the methodology--which cities were part of which metro areas, what percentage of a county's population was urban, what counties are part of which metro areas, and so on. But I think it does give a reasonably accurate big-picture view of the changing fortunes in America's urban landscape.







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