List of countries whose capital is not their largest city

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The list of countries whose capital is not their largest city refers to the list of sovereign states whose capital is not their most populated city.[a]

List

Country Capital Population Largest city Population Ratio Notes
 Australia Canberra 426,704 Sydney 5,312,163 12.6 A planned city, Canberra has been Australia's capital city since its foundation in 1913. However, the national parliament was based in Melbourne, Victoria until 1927.
 Belize Belmopan 20,621 Belize City 61,762 3.07 Belize City was the capital until 1970.
 Benin Porto-Novo 264,320 Cotonou 761,100 3.4 Cotonou is the de facto capital with seat of government. Both cities are part of the same metropolitan area
 Bolivia Sucre 259,388 Santa Cruz
de la Sierra[1]		 1,453,549 7.1 La Paz is the de facto capital with the seat of government; it is in Bolivia's second most populous metropolitan area.
 Brazil Brasília 3,500,000 São Paulo 12,252,023 4.25 Brasília is a planned city and has been the capital city since its inauguration in 1960. Rio de Janeiro was the capital from 1763 until 1960. Brasília is the third most populous city in Brazil and the seventh largest metropolitan area.
 Burundi Gitega 41,944 Bujumbura 1,092,859 26.06 Bujumbura was the capital until 2019.
 Cameroon Yaoundé 1,430,000 Douala 2,000,000 + 1.4 Yaoundé is the second largest city in Cameroon.
 Canada Ottawa 1,017,449 Toronto 2,794,356 3.08 Toronto was the capital of the Province of Canada from 1849 to 1852 and 1856 to 1858. For some years before, Kingston was the de facto capital, but when it came time to form the United Province of Canada in 1841 an official capital needed to be designated. There was much controversy until Queen Victoria made her ruling (supported by a vote with a majority of 3) that it should be Ottawa.[2][clarification needed]
 China, People's Republic of Beijing 22,000,000 Shanghai 30,484,300 1.39 With a population of more than 19 million, Beijing is the second largest city in China, after Shanghai.
 China, Republic of[3] Taipei 2,668,572 New Taipei 4,004,367 1.5 Taipei has been the provisional seat of the ROC central government since 1949. Until 1991, Nanjing was designated as the national capital of the country.
 Ecuador Quito 1,763,275 Guayaquil 2,650,288 1.5  
 Equatorial Guinea Malabo 187,302 Bata 250,770 1.34 The capital Malabo is the second largest city in Equatorial Guinea. It is to be replaced by the planned city of Oyala, currently under construction.
 Gambia Banjul 31,301 Serrekunda 337,000 2.18  
 India New Delhi 249,998 Mumbai 12,442,373 49.77 In 1912, the capital was moved from Calcutta (now Kolkata) to New Delhi. The neighbouring city of Delhi had previously served as the capital of the Mughal Empire.
 Israel Jerusalem (limited recognition) 363,095
(excluding
East Jerusalem)		 Tel Aviv 460,613 1.2 Jerusalem has only limited recognition as the capital of Israel. It would be Israel's largest city if East Jerusalem was included (increasing the population to 936,425). However, Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem is not internationally recognized. Without East Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, the internationally recognized capital, is Israel's largest city.
 Ivory Coast Yamoussoukro 200,659 Abidjan 4,348,000 21.7 Abidjan was the capital until 1983.
 Kazakhstan Astana 743,014 Almaty 1,450,095 1.95 Almaty was the capital from 1927 to 1997. Astana was named Nur-Sultan from 2019 until 2022.
 Liechtenstein Vaduz 5,109 Schaan 6,039 1.14 Vaduz is the second largest city in Liechtenstein. Both cities are part of the same metropolitan area.
 Federated States of Micronesia Palikir 5,000 Weno 13,000 1.4 Palikir is the second largest city of Micronesia.
 Malta Valletta 5,827 St. Paul's Bay 29,097 6.62 Valletta is part of the Central Region, a conurbation with a population of 111,994.
 Morocco Rabat 627,000 Casablanca 4,150,000 6.62 Rabat is the seventh largest city in Morocco.
 Myanmar Naypyidaw 925,000 Yangon 4,346,000 4.7 Yangon was the capital until 2006. Naypyidaw is a planned city and not does not have contiguous urban areas or a proper metro area.
 New Zealand Wellington 214,200 Auckland 1,531,400 7.15 Auckland was the capital from 1841 to 1865.
 Nigeria Abuja 778,567 Lagos 7,937,932 10.2 Lagos was the capital until 1991.
 Pakistan[4][5][6] Islamabad 1,014,825 Karachi 14,910,352 14.69 Karachi was the capital from 1947 to 1958.
 Palau Ngerulmud 0 Koror 11,200 - Koror was the capital until 2006.
 Palestine Jerusalem (limited recognition) - Gaza City 590,481 13.0 Jerusalem is claimed as the capital of the State of Palestine although East Jerusalem is still under Israeli occupation since 1967. Gaza City is the country's largest city prior to evacuations in 2023.
Ramallah (administrative centre) 104,173
 Philippines Manila 1,780,148 Quezon City 2,936,116 1.67 Quezon City, a northeastern suburb of Manila, was planned as the post-colonial capital of the Philippines and officially declared the capital after independence from 1948. In 1976, both cities were made part of the Metropolitan Manila region. It had overtaken Manila as the largest city proper of the Philippines by the 1990 census.
 San Marino San Marino 4,211 Serravalle 10,601 2.52  
 South Africa Pretoria 2,345,908 Johannesburg 5,635,000 1.66 Cape Town (pop. 4.8 million) and Bloemfontein (metro pop. 747,431) serve as legislative and judicial capitals respectively.
 Sri Lanka Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte 115,826 Colombo 642,163 5.54 Colombo was the official administrative capital until 1982, when it became the commercial capital.
  Switzerland Bern 138,041 Zürich 397,698 2.88 Switzerland does not have a de jure capital, but Bern was designated "federal city" with the seat of the two parliament chambers in 1848, when for the first time the independent Swiss states established standing federal authorities. Important federal authorities are also located in Lausanne (most notably: the Federal Supreme Court), Zürich, Lucerne, Bellinzona and St. Gallen.
 Tanzania Dodoma 324,347 Dar es Salaam 2,497,940 7.70 Dar es Salaam was the capital until 1974.
 Trinidad and Tobago Port of Spain 49,000 Chaguanas 67,400 1.37 Both cities are part of the same metropolitan area
 Turkey Ankara 5,150,072 Istanbul 14,377,018 3.4 Istanbul (as Constantinople) was the capital of the Ottoman Empire from 1453 to 1922.
 United Arab Emirates Abu Dhabi 896,751 Dubai 2,262,000 2.52 Abu Dhabi is the second largest city in the United Arab Emirates.
 United States Washington, D.C. 705,749 New York City 8,398,748 12.72 New York was the capital from 1785 to 1790 and the largest city in 1790 (narrowly edging out the next capital, Philadelphia, which served as capital from 1790 to 1800). Philadelphia was the nation's second-largest city when it was the capital. Washington is the 20th-largest city in the United States, but the Washington metropolitan area is the sixth-largest (estimated 6,216,589 in 2017).
 Vietnam Hanoi 8,053,663 Ho Chi Minh City 8,993,082 1.1 Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon, was the capital of South Vietnam prior to reunification.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ The population data is based on city proper instead of metropolitan area

References

  1. ^ "Decreto Supremo Nº1672" (PDF). doctoraedilicia.com. Retrieved 2013-05-31.
  2. ^ "Remember This? Queen Victoria chooses Ottawa".
  3. ^ Dept. of Household Registration, Ministry of the Interior Republic of China(Taiwan) (2018-05-01). "Dept. of Household Registration, Ministry of the Interior. Republic of China(Taiwan)". Dept. of Household Registration, Ministry of the Interior. Republic of China(Taiwan). Retrieved 2023-10-22.
  4. ^ "Ten major cities' population up by 74pc". Retrieved 2017-09-06.
  5. ^ "Daily Mashriq" (in Urdu). Retrieved 2017-09-06.
  6. ^ "District Wise Census Results Census 2017" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2017-08-29.