Guadalajara metropolitan area

• 1. Introduction

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  The Guadalajara metropolitan area takes its official Spanish name from the city at its core. That city, however, is not the most populous of the eight municipalities that make up the region. In the 2020 census, Zapopan counted 1,476,491 residents. Guadalajara proper recorded 1,385,629. The neighboring municipality outpaced its namesake by nearly 91,000 people. Together, all eight municipalities held 5,268,642 residents, making this the third largest metropolitan zone in Mexico. Only Greater Mexico City and Monterrey rank above it. What drove that mass of five million people together into one recognized zone is a story the census data charts across thirty years. Which corners of the region are growing fastest today is a question the numbers begin to answer.

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• 2. Eight Cities, One Zone

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  Guadalajara proper covers just 150.36 square kilometers, the smallest footprint among the eight municipalities. At 9,215 residents per square kilometer, its density vastly exceeds every other part of the zone. Zapopan, the most populous municipality, spreads across 1,017.24 square kilometers with a density of 1,451 residents per square kilometer.

  Tlajomulco de Zuniga holds 727,750 residents across 682.5 square kilometers, giving it a density of just 1,066 per square kilometer. Tlaquepaque covers 118.60 square kilometers and holds 687,720 people. Tonalá holds 569,913 residents in 156.5 square kilometers.

  El Salto recorded 232,852 residents in 2020 across 92.39 square kilometers, with a density of 2,520 per square kilometer. Ixtlahuacán de los Membrillos had 67,969 residents spread over 184.32 square kilometers. Juanacatlán, with 141.22 square kilometers and just 30,855 residents, has a density of 218 per square kilometer, the lowest in the zone. In 2015, the zone counted 4,796,603 residents across all eight municipalities. Between that census and the 2020 count, the metropolitan area added nearly half a million people.

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• 3. Three Decades of Expansion

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  From just over three million people in 1990, the Guadalajara metropolitan area added more than two million residents in three decades. The fastest annual growth in that period came in the first half of the 1990s, when the average rate reached 2.7 percent.

  Between 1995 and 2000, the annual rate fell to 1.4 percent, the slowest recorded in the data. Growth recovered modestly through the 2000s, averaging 1.7 percent between 2000 and 2005 and 1.55 percent between 2005 and 2010.

  Tlajomulco de Zuniga grew from 549,552 residents in 2015 to 727,750 by 2020, an increase of more than 178,000 people in five years. El Salto rose from 183,437 to 232,852 over the same span. Juanacatlán, the smallest municipality by population, went from 17,955 in 2015 to 30,855 in 2020. That represents a gain of more than 70 percent in five years.

  Across all eight municipalities, the metropolitan zone covers 2,543.13 square kilometers. The average density reached more than 2,071 residents per square kilometer in 2020. That figure will likely rise as the outer municipalities continue to expand.

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