Subdivisions of Brazil - Demographics - Urbanization

Urbanization

Main article: List of largest cities in Brazil

According to IBGE (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics) urban areas already concentrate 84.35% of the population, while the Southeast region remains the most populated one, with over 80 million inhabitants. The largest metropolitan areas in Brazil are São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Belo Horizonte — all in the Southeastern Region — with 19.5, 11.5, and 5.1 million inhabitants respectively.

Almost all of the state capitals are the largest cities in their states, except for Vitória, the capital of Espírito Santo, and Florianópolis, the capital of Santa Catarina. There are also non-capital metropolitan areas in the states of São Paulo (Campinas, Santos and the Paraíba Valley), Minas Gerais (Steel Valley), Rio Grande do Sul (Sinos Valley) and Santa Catarina (Itajaí Valley).


Largest cities or towns of Brazil
2010 Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics estimate
Rank City name State Pop. Rank City name State Pop.

São Paulo


Rio de Janeiro

1 São Paulo São Paulo 11,316,149 11 Belém Pará 1,402,056
Salvador


Brasília

2 Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro 6,355,949 12 Goiânia Goiás 1,318,148
3 Salvador Bahia 3,093,605 13 Guarulhos São Paulo 1,233,426
4 Brasília Distrito Federal 2,609,997 14 Campinas São Paulo 1,088,611
5 Fortaleza Ceará 2,476,589 15 São Luís Maranhão 1,027,429
6 Belo Horizonte Minas Gerais 2,385,639 16 São Gonçalo Rio de Janeiro 1,008,064
7 Manaus Amazonas 1,832,423 17 Maceió Alagoas 943,109
8 Curitiba Paraná 1,764,540 18 Duque de Caxias Rio de Janeiro 861,157
9 Recife Pernambuco 1,536,934 19 Teresina Piauí 822,363
10 Porto Alegre Rio Grande do Sul 1,413,094 20 Natal Rio Grande do Norte 810,780

Read more about this topic:  Subdivisions Of Brazil, Demographics