Urban areas of New Zealand

Statistics New Zealand defines urban areas of New Zealand for statistical purposes (they have no administrative or legal basis). The urban areas comprise cities, towns and other conurbations (an aggregation of urban settlements) of a thousand people or more. In combination, the urban areas of the country constitute New Zealand's urban population. As of June 2025, the urban population made up 84.5% of New Zealand's total population.

The current standard for urban areas is the Statistical Standard for Geographic Areas 2023 (SSGA23), an update of SSGA18, which had replaced the New Zealand Standard Areas Classification 1992 (NZSAC92) in 2018. There are four classes of urban area under SSGA23 and SSGA18 – major, large, medium and small. Each urban area consists of one or more level-2 statistical areas (SA2s). Urban areas under SSGA18 do not cross territorial authority boundaries, with one exception (Richmond, which lies in the Tasman District but includes the Daelyn SA2 area from neighbouring Nelson City).

Under SSGA18, details of the four classes were:

  • Major urban areas have a population of 100,000 or more. There are seven of them, with a combined population of 2,734,900 (51.4% of the total population).
  • Large urban areas have a population of 30,000 to 99,999. There are 13 of them, with a combined population of 727,300 (13.7% of the total population).
  • Medium urban areas have a population of 10,000 to 29,999. There are 23 of them, with a combined population of 482,500 (9.1% of the total population).
  • Small urban areas have a population of 1,000 to 9,999. There are 152 of them, with a combined population of 556,900 (10.5% of the total population).

Statistics New Zealand also defines rural settlements with a population of 200 to 999 people or at least 40 dwellings. While these do not fit the standard international definition of an urban population, they serve to distinguish between true rural dwellers and those in rural settlements or towns. There are 402 rural settlements which combined have a population of 157,800 (3.0% of the total population).

While SSGA23 is similar to SSGA18, it added a new geographical area (SA3), upgraded Wānaka to a medium urban area, upgraded seven rural settlements to small urban areas, and created thirteen new rural settlements.

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