1,206-CITY ATLASSOURCE-BACKED CITY REFERENCE
Tanzania
Compare this sourced profile of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania before planning. Stable fields identify the place; confirm current transport, access and opening details with official sources.
01What the data says — and does not say
This page separates the checked GeoNames row for Dar es Salaam—5,383,728, Africa/Dar_es_Salaam, and source coordinates—from live travel claims. Those fields identify and compare the record; they do not prove current transport, accessibility, census totals, or a City Atlas Club visit.
Wikidata's localized description: largest city in Tanzania and capital of Dar es Salaam Region.
02This city's dataset fingerprint
The source row behind Dar es Salaam is GeoNames ID 160263. Its recorded administrative path is Ilala → Dar es Salaam Region → Tanzania, and GeoNames classifies the place as a first-order administrative seat. Dar es Salaam occurs once as a primary city label in this atlas sample; the numeric ID remains the durable source key if names change. The city row itself was updated 2026-04-14; that date belongs to the source record, not to every transport or visitor detail in the real destination.
Within the fixed 1,206-record atlas, Dar es Salaam ranks 53 by recorded population. Inside the 6 selected Tanzania entries it ranks 1; inside the 243 entries in its broad region it ranks 9. Its 5,383,728 population value is 7.30 times the 737,494 median for the country cohort and 5.96 times the 902,588 regional median. Dar es Salaam is rank 1 among the 6 selected Tanzania entries, so a percentage band would overstate this small cohort. Dar es Salaam's recorded value reaches at least twice the country-cohort median in this snapshot. These comparisons describe this selected dataset only; they are not current census rankings or official urban-area boundaries.
Dar es Salaam's three nearest other atlas coordinates are Zanzibar City at 73.764 km with 709,809 recorded people; Mombasa at 310.954 km with 1,208,333 recorded people; Dodoma at 396.665 km with 765,179 recorded people. The closest-to-farthest distance spread is 322.901 km. Compared with Zanzibar City, Dar es Salaam's recorded population is 7.58 times as large. Against Dar es Salaam, Zanzibar City follows Mjini → Zanzibar Urban/West → Tanzania in the source. Its point has higher latitude and lower longitude; it belongs to the same selected Tanzania cohort, uses the shared Africa/Dar_es_Salaam identifier, and carries the same first-order administrative seat class. Its recorded population is below Dar es Salaam's. Against Dar es Salaam, Mombasa follows Mombasa County → Kenya in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the selected Kenya cohort rather than Tanzania, uses Africa/Nairobi instead of Africa/Dar_es_Salaam, and carries the same first-order administrative seat class. Its recorded population is below Dar es Salaam's. Against Dar es Salaam, Dodoma follows Dodoma Urban District → Dodoma → Tanzania in the source. Its point has higher latitude and lower longitude; it belongs to the same selected Tanzania cohort, uses the shared Africa/Dar_es_Salaam identifier, and carries capital of a political entity rather than first-order administrative seat. Its recorded population is below Dar es Salaam's. Its nearest-neighbor distance ranks 581 of 1,206 from shortest to longest in the same snapshot. Dar es Salaam's nearest-coordinate gap sits in the second quarter of atlas distances. This pattern can reveal whether other catalog references are geographically close, but it cannot establish whether a border crossing is possible or practical, or whether rail, road, fare, or journey-time connections exist. Read as one record signature, GeoNames 160263, the coordinate pair 6.8235 / 39.2695, country rank 1 of 6, and neighbor GeoNames 148730 at 73.764 km bind Dar es Salaam to a reproducible comparison. That combined key distinguishes the row; it is not a recommendation or evidence of a physical connection.
Dar es Salaam's reference point is 6.8235° south and 39.2695° east. The IANA identifier Africa/Dar_es_Salaam is shared by 6 city rows in this catalog, while the GeoNames class PPLA is shared by 429 rows. Dar es Salaam's row carries both second- and first-order administrative labels. Dar es Salaam's point falls in the near-equatorial coordinate band used by this atlas's row checks. Dar es Salaam's time-zone field defines the narrower catalog cohort; its place class is shared more broadly. GeoNames supplies no elevation for Dar es Salaam, so the profile preserves that missing value instead of guessing terrain. Together these fields form a reproducible identity check for this page, not a claim about walkability, climate or accessibility.
03Nearby atlas references
Dar es Salaam's closest other entries in this atlas are Zanzibar City (73.764 km), Mombasa (310.954 km), Dodoma (396.665 km).
04Verify before you book
Before visiting Dar es Salaam, confirm changing decisions with current first-party sources:
Read how City Atlas Club verifies changing travel facts →05Sources and freshness
GeoNames updated the row 2026-04-14; the atlas checked the dataset 2026-08-04. Available Wikidata fields were verified in the same run.
GeoNames data: CC BY 4.0. Wikidata labels and descriptions: CC0 1.0.