1,206-CITY ATLASSOURCE-BACKED CITY REFERENCE
United States
Compare this sourced profile of Washington, D.C., United States 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 Washington, D.C.—689,545, America/New_York, 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.
02This city's dataset fingerprint
The source row behind Washington, D.C. is GeoNames ID 4140963. Its recorded administrative path is District of Columbia → United States, and GeoNames classifies the place as a capital of a political entity. Washington 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 2026-06-12; 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, Washington, D.C. ranks 796 by recorded population. Inside the 43 selected United States entries it ranks 24; inside the 198 entries in its broad region it ranks 121. Its 689,545 population value is 0.88 times the 780,995 median for the country cohort and 0.84 times the 816,326 regional median. Washington, D.C. sits in the lower half of this atlas's selected United States entries. Washington, D.C.'s recorded value stays within one quarter of the country-cohort median used here. These comparisons describe this selected dataset only; they are not current census rankings or official urban-area boundaries.
Washington, D.C.'s three nearest other atlas coordinates are Baltimore at 57.2 km with 585,708 recorded people; Philadelphia at 199.233 km with 1,573,916 recorded people; Brooklyn at 328.104 km with 2,736,074 recorded people. The closest-to-farthest distance spread is 270.904 km. Compared with Baltimore, Washington, D.C.'s recorded population is 1.18 times as large. Against Washington, D.C., Baltimore follows City of Baltimore → Maryland → United States in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the same selected United States cohort, uses the shared America/New_York identifier, and carries second-order administrative seat rather than capital of a political entity. Its recorded population is below Washington, D.C.'s. Against Washington, D.C., Philadelphia follows Philadelphia County → Pennsylvania → United States in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the same selected United States cohort, uses the shared America/New_York identifier, and carries second-order administrative seat rather than capital of a political entity. Its recorded population is above Washington, D.C.'s. Against Washington, D.C., Brooklyn follows Kings County → New York → United States in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the same selected United States cohort, uses the shared America/New_York identifier, and carries second-order administrative seat rather than capital of a political entity. Its recorded population is above Washington, D.C.'s. Its nearest-neighbor distance ranks 485 of 1,206 from shortest to longest in the same snapshot. Washington, D.C.'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 4140963, the coordinate pair 38.8951 / 77.0364, country rank 24 of 43, and neighbor GeoNames 4347778 at 57.2 km bind Washington, D.C. to a reproducible comparison. That combined key distinguishes the row; it is not a recommendation or evidence of a physical connection.
Washington, D.C.'s reference point is 38.8951° north and 77.0364° west. The IANA identifier America/New_York is shared by 15 city rows in this catalog, while the GeoNames class PPLC is shared by 129 rows. Washington, D.C.'s row carries a first-order administrative label but no second-order label. Washington, D.C.'s point falls in the middle-latitude coordinate band used by this atlas's row checks. Washington, D.C.'s time-zone field defines the narrower catalog cohort; its place class is shared more broadly. GeoNames records Washington, D.C. at 7 metres above sea level, a single reference value rather than a description of slopes across the city. Together these fields form a reproducible identity check for this page, not a claim about walkability, climate or accessibility.
03Nearby atlas references
Washington, D.C.'s closest other entries in this atlas are Baltimore (57.2 km), Philadelphia (199.233 km), Brooklyn (328.104 km).
04Verify before you book
Before visiting Washington, D.C., confirm changing decisions with current first-party sources:
Read how City Atlas Club verifies changing travel facts →05Sources and freshness
GeoNames updated the row 2026-06-12; 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.