Seattle just achieved a notable milestone. For the first time, Seattle’s population has passed the 800,000 threshold. The Emerald City is now home to 816,000 people (and countless dogs, probably). At this rate of growth, Seattle could surpass the population size of another major West Coast city soon.
Read on for all the details!
With the Seattle population now at 816,000 in 2025, that is estimated to be a population increase of about 2.4% since last year. Meanwhile, the overall United States population is growing at a slower rate.
Earlier this year Axios reported that the Seattle metro area was growing faster than the country overall, mostly due to foreign immigration. According to the Census Bureau in March 2025, the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metro area’s population increased by 66,666 from 2023 to 2024. This was an increase of about 1.6%, in comparison to a 1% increase during that same time period for the entire country.
This population milestone has occurred at the same time as a competitive housing market and news about newly-built apartments in Seattle achieving the distinction of being the smallest apartments in the country. Yet when asked in an open-ended survey, enough respondents said Seattle for it to earn a place on the list of the top five U.S. cities that Americans want to live in.
With all this rapid population growth, Seattle suddenly has the potential to eclipse another major city on the West Coast: San Francisco. Between 2024 and 2025, San Francisco lost about 3,000 residents. In that same time, Seattle gained almost 19,000 people. Unless one or both cities see a change in their growth trajectory, Seattle’s population could surpass that of San Francisco in two years, according to The Seattle Times. Stay tuned, and in the meantime, be sure to tell everyone from out of town how much it rains here.