Cities

69 to explore · page 2 of 2

• Watch City Rome Rome, the capital of Italy, grew from huts on a hill beside the Tiber River into the center of a huge ancient empire. About 2.7 million people live there today (2023), among ruins such as the Colosseum and the Pantheon.
• Watch City Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, in northwestern Russia, was founded by Tsar Peter the Great in 1703 on the islands of the Neva River delta. It was Russia's capital from 1712 to 1918 and is famous for the Winter Palace and Hermitage museum, its canals and bridges and its 'White Nights'. About 5.65 million people lived there in 2025.
• Watch City San Francisco San Francisco sits on the tip of a peninsula between the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay in California. Spanish settlers arrived in 1776, the Gold Rush that began in 1848 turned it into a booming port, and today it is famous for the Golden Gate Bridge, its cable cars, its steep hills and its summer fog.
• Watch City Santiago Santiago, the capital and largest city of Chile, lies in a basin in central Chile with the high Andes to the east. Founded by the Spanish in 1541, it mixes colonial churches with the tallest skyscraper in the city, the 300-meter Gran Torre Costanera. About 5.25 million people lived in the city in 2017.
• Watch City São Paulo São Paulo, capital of the state of São Paulo, is the largest city in the Southern Hemisphere. It began as a small Jesuit mission in 1554 and grew huge after coffee became Brazil's main export. About 11.9 million people live in the city (2025), with families whose roots reach from Italy and Portugal to Japan and Lebanon.
• Watch City Seoul Seoul is the capital of South Korea, on the Han River. It became a capital in 1394, and its old palaces and city gates still stand among skyscrapers. About 9.7 million people lived there in 2020, and its subway is one of the main ways to get around.
• Watch City Shanghai Shanghai is China's most populous city, on the coast where the great Yangtze River meets the East China Sea. Once a small fishing village, it grew into one of the world's busiest seaports. About 24.9 million people lived in Shanghai in 2020, and the towers of Pudong rise across the Huangpu River.
• Watch City Sofia Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, lies in a valley near the middle of the Balkans, at the foot of Vitosha Mountain. The Romans called it Serdica, and an old church of St. Sofia later gave the city its name. About 1.2 million people lived there in 2025.
• Watch City Stockholm Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, is built on islands and the mainland where Lake Mälaren meets an arm of the Baltic Sea. First mentioned as a town in 1252, it has a medieval Old Town, a royal palace, a 17th-century warship you can visit and subway stations full of art. About 985,000 people lived there in 2022.
• Watch City Sydney Sydney is Australia's largest city and the capital of the state of New South Wales. It surrounds Port Jackson, a harbor of countless bays, on the lands of the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. The British set up a convict colony here in 1788. Today the Harbour Bridge, the Opera House and its beaches are world famous, and about 5.45 million people lived in Greater Sydney in 2023.
• Watch City Tallinn Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, lies on a bay of the Gulf of Finland. Its walled Old Town, with towers, church spires and a town hall finished in 1404, is, says UNESCO, an exceptionally complete and well-preserved medieval trading town, and today the city is also known for its technology companies.
• Watch City Tbilisi Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, lies along the Mtkvari River between mountain ridges. Its name comes from the Georgian word for "warm", after the hot springs that feed its old bathhouses. At the 2024 census, 1,331,485 people lived in the self-governing city.
• Watch City Tehran Tehran, the capital of Iran, spreads up the slopes of the Alborz Mountains, with snowy peaks to the north and desert to the south. Once a small village, and later a market town known for its pomegranates, it became the capital in 1786. Today it is a huge, modern city with an old roofed bazaar, a palace that is a World Heritage Site and the 435-meter Milad Tower.
• Watch City Tirana Tirana is the capital and largest city of Albania, on a plain about 27 kilometers from the Adriatic Sea. Founded in the early 1600s, it became the capital in 1920. About 389,000 people lived in the city in 2023.
• Watch City Tokyo Tokyo is the capital of Japan, at the head of Tokyo Bay. It began as the small town of Edo and was renamed Tokyo, the Eastern Capital, in 1868. About 14.3 million people lived in the Tokyo Metropolis in 2022, and Greater Tokyo is Japan's largest city region.
• Watch City Valparaíso Valparaíso is a busy port on Chile's Pacific coast, built around a bay on steep hills. Founded in 1536, it became the leading port on South America's Pacific coast in the late 1800s. Its historic quarter, with hillside neighborhoods and funicular "elevators," is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and Chile's National Congress meets here.
• Watch City Venice Venice, in northern Italy, is spread over 118 small islands in a shallow lagoon off the Adriatic Sea. There are no cars in the old city: people walk or travel by boat along its canals, past palaces and over about 400 bridges. High tides sometimes flood its squares, so giant gates now protect the lagoon.
• Watch City Vienna Vienna is the capital of Austria, on the Danube River. For centuries it was the home of emperors, and composers such as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven lived and worked there. About 2 million people lived in the city at the start of 2026.
• Watch City Vilnius Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, grew where the Vilnia River flows into the Neris, below a castle on a hill. It was first written about in 1323, when it was already the capital of a huge state, and its old town of Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque buildings is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. About 618,000 people lived there in 2026.
• Watch City Warsaw Warsaw is the capital of Poland, on the Vistula River. Much of the city was destroyed in World War II, and afterward its people rebuilt the Old Town so carefully that UNESCO made it a World Heritage Site. About 1.86 million people lived there in 2024.
• Watch City Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., is the capital of the United States, on the Potomac River. It was planned from scratch in the 1790s, with wide avenues, the U.S. Capitol, the White House and a long green park called the National Mall. About 690,000 people lived there in 2020.