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List of the largest metropolitan areas in the Americas

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This is a list of the fifty largest metropolitan area

Metropolitan area

A metropolitan area is a large population center consisting of a large metropolis and its adjacent zone of influence, or of more than one closely adjoining neighboring central cities and their zone of influence...

s in the Americas. Official definitions of metropolitan area are used where available. For cities in countries that do not have official metropolitan area definitions, the urban agglomeration concept is used instead.

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This is a list of the fifty largest metropolitan area

Metropolitan area

Rank	Metropolitan area	Population	Year
1	BRA São Paulo Greater São Paulo The Greater São Paulo is a nonspecific term for the large metropolitan area located in the São Paulo state in Brazil.-Definitions:1...	19,889,559	2009
2	MEX Mexico City Greater Mexico City Greater Mexico City refers to the conurbation around Mexico City, officially called Mexico City Metropolitan Area , constituted by the Federal District—itself composed of 16 boroughs—and 41 adjacent municipalities of the states of Mexico and Hidalgo...	19,239,910	2005
3	USA New York New York metropolitan area The New York metropolitan area, also known as Metropolitan New York, Greater New York, or the Tri-State Region, is the most populous metropolitan area in the United States and is also one of the most populous in the world. The metropolitan area is defined by the U.S...	19,006,798	2008
4	USA Los Angeles	12,872,808	2008
5	ARG Buenos Aires Greater Buenos Aires Greater Buenos Aires is the generic denomination to refer to the megalopolis comprised by the autonomous city of Buenos Aires and the conurbation around it over the province of Buenos Aires—namely the adjacent 24 partidos or municipalities—which nonetheless do not constitute a single...	12,795,000	2007
6	BRA Rio de Janeiro Greater Rio de Janeiro The Greater Rio de Janeiro is a large metropolitan area located in Rio de Janeiro state in Brazil...	11,529,194	2007
7	USA Chicago	9,569,624	2008
8	PER Lima Lima Metropolitan Area The Lima Metropolitan Area , is an area formed by the conurbation of the Peruvian cities of Lima and Callao. It is the largest metropolitan area in Peru, is the eighth largest in the Americas, and among the thirty largest in the world. The conurbation process started to be evident in the 1980s...	8,482,619	2007
9	COL Bogotá Metropolitan Area of Bogotá Metropolitan Area of Bogotá is the unofficial metropolitan area of the Colombian capital city of Bogotá, usually used for statistical analysis or technical use....	8,228,230	2007
10	USA Dallas Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex The Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington metropolitan area, a title designated by the U.S. Census as of 2003, encompasses 12 counties within the U.S. state of Texas. The metropolitan area is further divided into two metropolitan divisions: Dallas–Plano–Irving and Fort Worth–Arlington...	6,300,006	2008
11	USA Philadelphia Delaware Valley The Delaware Valley is a term used widely by the media to refer, perhaps misleadingly, to the metropolitan area centered on the city of Philadelphia in the United States. The term is derived from the Delaware River, which flows through the area, although the river extends more than 100 miles to the...	5,838,471	2008
12	USA Houston Greater Houston Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown is a 10-county metropolitan area defined by the Office of Management and Budget. It is located along the Gulf Coast region in the U.S. state of Texas...	5,728,143	2008
13	CHI Santiago Santiago, Chile Santiago , is the capital and largest city of Chile, and the centre of its largest conurbation . It is located in the country's central valley, at an elevation of 520 m AMSL...	5,720,000	2007
14	CAN Toronto Greater Toronto Area The Greater Toronto Area is the most populous metropolitan area in Canada. The GTA is a provincial planning area in Southern Ontario with a population of 5,555,912 at the 2006 Canadian Census...	5,531,300	2008
15	USA Miami	5,414,772	2008
16	BRA Belo Horizonte Belo Horizonte Belo Horizonte is the capital of the state of Minas Gerais, located in the southeastern region of Brazil. It is the third-largest metropolitan area in the country...	5,403,050	2007
17	USA Atlanta	5,376,130	2008
18	USA Washington Washington Metropolitan Area The Washington Metropolitan Area, formally known as the Washington–Arlington–Alexandria, DC–VA–MD–WV MSA, is a U.S. Metropolitan Statistical Area defined by the United States Office of Management and Budget . It is also part of the larger Baltimore-Washington Metropolitan Area...	5,358,130	2008
19	VEN Caracas Caracas Caracas is the capital and largest city of Venezuela. It is located in the north of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range . The valley's temperatures are springlike. Terrain suitable for building lies between 760 and 910 m above...	4,950,000	2009
20	USA Boston Greater Boston Greater Boston is the area of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts surrounding the city of Boston. Due to ambiguity in usage, the size of the area referred to can be anywhere between that of the metropolitan statistical area of Boston to that of the city's combined statistical area which includes...	4,522,858	2008
21	USA Detroit	4,425,110	2008
22	USA Phoenix Phoenix Metropolitan Area The Phoenix metropolitan area, often referred to as The Valley of the Sun, is a metropolitan area, centered on the city of Phoenix, that includes much of the central part of the U.S. state of Arizona...	4,281,899	2008
23	USA San Francisco San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, or the Yay Area, is a metropolitan region that surrounds the San Francisco and San Pablo estuaries in Northern California. The region encompasses large cities such as San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose, along with smaller urban and...	4,274,531	2008
24	USA Riverside-San Bernardino Inland Empire (California) The Inland Empire is a large metropolitan area located in Southeastern California, consisting of two counties, Riverside and San Bernardino counties. With a population of over 4 million people, it is the second largest metropolitan area in Southern California, third in California, 14th largest in...	4,115,871	2008
25	MEX Guadalajara Guadalajara Metropolitan Area The Guadalajara Metropolitan Area is the most populous metropolitan area of the Mexican state of Jalisco and the second largest in the country after Greater Mexico City...	4,095,853	2005
26	BRA Porto Alegre Porto Alegre Porto Alegre is the eleventh most populous municipality in Brazil and the capital city of the southernmost Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul. The city is the southernmost capital city of a Brazilian state. Porto Alegre is one of the most important cultural, political and economic centers of...	3,975,545	2007
27	CAN Montreal	3,750,500	2008
28	MEX Monterrey Monterrey Metropolitan area The Monterrey metropolitan area refers to the conurbation around the city of Monterrey, officially called Area Metropolitana de la Ciudad de Monterrey or AMM...	3,738,077	2005
29	BRA Recife Recife Recife is the 5th largest Metropolitan area in Brazil with 3,768,902 inhabitants, the largest metropolitan area of the North/Northeast Regions, the 4th largest metropolitan influence area in Brazil, and the capital of the state of Pernambuco. The population of the city proper was 1,561,659 in 2009...	3,661,119	2007
30	BRA Salvador	3,599,538	2007
31	BRA Brasília Brasília Brasília is the capital of Brazil. The city and its District are located in the Central-West region of the country, along a plateau known as Planalto Central. It has a population of about 2,557,000 as of the 2008 IBGE estimate, making it the fourth largest city in Brazil, ahead of Belo Horizonte... (RIDE)	3,558,166	2007
32	COL Medellín	3,401,337	2007
33	BRA Fortaleza Fortaleza Fortaleza is the state capital of Ceará, located in Northeastern Brazil. With a population of over 3.4 million , Fortaleza has an area of...	3,376,883	2007
34	USA Seattle Seattle metropolitan area The Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington includes the city of Seattle, King County, Snohomish County, and Pierce County within the Puget Sound region. The U.S...	3,344,813	2008
35	USA Minneapolis	3,229,878	2008
36	DOM Santo Domingo	3,150,000	2009
37	BRA Curitiba Curitiba Curitiba is the capital city of the Brazilian state of Paraná. The city has the largest population and also the largest economy in Southern Brazil...	3,139,389	2007
38	USA San Diego	3,001,072	2008
39	USA St. Louis	2,816,710	2008
40	USA Tampa Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, Florida, Metropolitan Statistical Area The Tampa Bay Area, or Tampa Bay, after the body of water it surrounds, is the second most populated metropolitan region in the state of Florida, the 19th-largest metro area in the United States, the fourth largest in the Southeast behind only Miami, Atlanta and Washington, and second largest on...	2,733,761	2008
41	GUA Guatemala City Guatemala City Guatemala City is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Guatemala...	2,725,000	2009
42	USA Baltimore Baltimore Metropolitan Area The Baltimore-Towson Metropolitan Statistical Area is a Metropolitan Statistical Area in Maryland as defined by the United States Office of Management and Budget...	2,667,761	2008
43	COL Cali	2,656,180	2007
44	PUR San Juan San Juan, Puerto Rico San Juan is the capital and largest municipality in Puerto Rico. As of the 2000 census, it has a population of 433,733, making it the 42nd-largest city under the jurisdiction of the United States. San Juan was founded by Spanish colonists in 1521, who called it Ciudad de Puerto Rico...	2,608,375	2008
45	ECU Guayaquil Guayaquil Guayaquil , officially Santiago de Guayaquil, is the largest and the most populous city in Ecuador, as well as that nation's main port. The city is the capital of the Ecuadorian province of Guayas and the seat of the namesake canton....	2,514,000	2007
46	USA Denver	2,506,626	2008
47	BRA Campinas Campinas Campinas is a city and county located in the interior of the state of São Paulo, Brazil.The county area is 797,6 km². Population is approximately 1,059,420 , with over 98% in the urban region. Its metropolitan area, defined in 2000, has some 19 cities and a population of 3,2 million people...	2,484,555	2007
48	MEX Puebla Metropolitan area of Puebla The Metropolitan area of Puebla or Greater Puebla is the fourth largest agglomeration in Mexico with a population of 2.109 million . This agglomeration includes 10 municipalities of the state of Puebla, and 13 municipalities of the state of Tlaxcala...	2,470,206	2005
49	USA Pittsburgh	2,351,192	2008
50	VEN Maracaibo Maracaibo Maracaibo is the second-largest city in Venezuela after the national capital Caracas and is the capital of Zulia state. Based on the 2001 census information, the estimated population of Maracaibo in 2007 is 3,200,000 inhabitants....	2,325,000	2009

List of the largest metropolitan areas in the Americas

See also