1,206-CITY ATLASSOURCE-BACKED CITY REFERENCE
South Africa
Compare this sourced profile of Durban, South Africa 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 Durban—3,338,026, Africa/Johannesburg, 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: city in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.
02This city's dataset fingerprint
The source row behind Durban is GeoNames ID 1007311. Its recorded administrative path is eThekwini Metropolitan Municipality → KwaZulu-Natal → South Africa, and GeoNames classifies the place as a second-order administrative seat. Durban 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 2025-02-24; 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, Durban ranks 104 by recorded population. Inside the 12 selected South Africa entries it ranks 3; inside the 243 entries in its broad region it ranks 23. Its 3,338,026 population value is 3.47 times the 961,194 median for the country cohort and 3.70 times the 902,588 regional median. Durban falls between the leading tenth and quarter of this atlas's South Africa population cohort. Durban'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.
Durban's three nearest other atlas coordinates are Pietermaritzburg at 67.041 km with 839,327 recorded people; Matola at 455.375 km with 1,198,988 recorded people; Maputo at 458.94 km with 1,254,837 recorded people. The closest-to-farthest distance spread is 391.899 km. Compared with Pietermaritzburg, Durban's recorded population is 3.98 times as large. Against Durban, Pietermaritzburg follows uMgungundlovu District Municipality → KwaZulu-Natal → South Africa in the source. Its point has higher latitude and lower longitude; it belongs to the same selected South Africa cohort, uses the shared Africa/Johannesburg identifier, and carries first-order administrative seat rather than second-order administrative seat. Its recorded population is below Durban's. Against Durban, Matola follows Maputo Province → Mozambique in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the selected Mozambique cohort rather than South Africa, uses Africa/Maputo instead of Africa/Johannesburg, and carries first-order administrative seat rather than second-order administrative seat. Its recorded population is below Durban's. Against Durban, Maputo follows Maputo City → Mozambique in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the selected Mozambique cohort rather than South Africa, uses Africa/Maputo instead of Africa/Johannesburg, and carries capital of a political entity rather than second-order administrative seat. Its recorded population is below Durban's. Its nearest-neighbor distance ranks 540 of 1,206 from shortest to longest in the same snapshot. Durban'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 1007311, the coordinate pair 29.8579 / 31.0292, country rank 3 of 12, and neighbor GeoNames 965301 at 67.041 km bind Durban to a reproducible comparison. That combined key distinguishes the row; it is not a recommendation or evidence of a physical connection.
Durban's reference point is 29.8579° south and 31.0292° east. The IANA identifier Africa/Johannesburg is shared by 12 city rows in this catalog, while the GeoNames class PPLA2 is shared by 341 rows. Durban's row carries both second- and first-order administrative labels. Durban's point falls in the lower-latitude coordinate band used by this atlas's row checks. Durban's time-zone field defines the narrower catalog cohort; its place class is shared more broadly. GeoNames supplies no elevation for Durban, 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
Durban's closest other entries in this atlas are Pietermaritzburg (67.041 km), Matola (455.375 km), Maputo (458.94 km).
04Verify before you book
Before visiting Durban, confirm changing decisions with current first-party sources:
Read how City Atlas Club verifies changing travel facts →05Sources and freshness
GeoNames updated the row 2025-02-24; 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.