Egypt is the most populous country in the Middle East, and the third-most populous on the African continent.
About 95% of the country’s people live along the banks of the Nile and in the Nile Delta, which fans out north of Cairo, and along the Suez Canal.
The map above illustrates Egypt’s high population density along the Nile.
In this view of Egypt, we see a population almost completely concentrated along the Nile Valley, just a small percentage of the country’s land area.
Reasons for Population Concentration Along the Nile
Several factors contribute to this high concentration of population along the Nile:
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- Water Source: The Nile River is the primary source of fresh water in a predominantly arid and desert region.
- Fertile Land: The annual flooding of the Nile deposits nutrient-rich silt onto the floodplain, creating fertile soil suitable for agriculture.
- Agricultural Productivity: The Nile Valley and Delta are some of the most productive agricultural regions in the world.
- Historical Development: Ancient civilizations, including the Egyptians, settled along the Nile due to its resources.
- Economic Activities: The Nile supports various economic activities such as fishing, transportation, and tourism.
- Climate: The Nile provides a relatively moderate climate compared to the surrounding desert regions.
- Urban Centers: Major cities, including Cairo and Alexandria, are located along the Nile.
- Irrigation and Infrastructure: Extensive irrigation systems have been developed to maximize the agricultural potential of the Nile Valley.
The Nile River and its delta look like a brilliant, long-stemmed flower in this astronaut photograph of the south-eastern Mediterranean Sea, as seen from the International Space Station. The Cairo metropolitan area forms a particularly bright base of the flower.
The smaller cities and towns within the Nile Delta tend to be hard to see amidst the dense agricultural vegetation during the day.
However, these settled areas and the connecting roads between them become clearly visible at night.
Small communities spread throughout the desert regions of Egypt are clustered around historic trade and transportation routes.
The government has tried with mixed success to encourage migration to newly irrigated land reclaimed from the desert.
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According to the Peterson Institute for International Economics and other proponents of demographic structural approach (cliodynamics), the basic problem Egypt has is an unemployment rate driven by a demographic youth bulge: with the number of new people entering the job force at about 4% a year, unemployment in Egypt is almost 10 times as high for college graduates as it is for people who have gone through elementary school, particularly educated urban youth, who comprised most of the people that were seen out in the streets during the Egyptian revolution of 2011.
The Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) had released high/medium/low population projections for 2011-2031 based on Final Results of 2006 Population Census.
However the information could be misleading as the 2013 population figure of 84.6 million is higher than the projected high of 83 million.
In fact, due to an unexpected rise in the fertility rate (from 3.0 to 3.5), the population already surpassed 91 million on 5 June 2016 while reaching 92 million on 30 November, average population age remaining stable despite a rising life expectancy.
Egypt hosts a migrant population of over 9 million, constituting 8.7% of the country’s total population, according to the International Organization for Migration as of 2022.
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Egypt's resource crisis: Water, food, and a surging population • FRANCE 24 English
Demographics
Arabic is the official language of Egypt, with the vast majority of Egyptians speaking Egyptian Arabic.
In The Upper Nile valley regions, Sa'idi Arabic is prevalent.
The Coptic language is still used in the Coptic church for the majority of prayers, hymns, masses, and meditations.
English is widely understood.
Egyptians have a long history of mobility, primarily across the Arab world, but emigration became much more popular once it was recognised as a right in the 1971 Constitution.
According to the International Organization for Migration, an estimated 2.7 million Egyptians live abroad and contribute actively to the development of their country through remittances (US$7.8 billion in 2009), circulation of human and social capital, as well as investment.
Minorities in Egypt include the Berber-speaking community of the Siwa Oasis (Siwis) and the Nubian people clustered along the Nile in the southernmost part of Egypt.
Sa'idi Upper Egyptian boy from the Luxor Governate.
The country was also host to many different communities during the European occupation period, including Greeks, Italians, and also from war-torn areas; the Lebanese, Syro-Lebanese, and other minority groups like Jews, Armenians, Turks and Albanians, though most either left or were compelled to leave after political developments in the 1950s.
Other sources give more detailed statistics, including the Beja (ca. 88,000), the Nubians (ca. 300,000 in 1996), Dom (ca. 230,000 in 1996), Berbers (Siwis) (ca.
In 2017, the Wall Street Journal reported that "the vast majority of Egypt's estimated 9.5 million Christians, approximately 10% of the country's population, are Orthodox Copts."
In 2019, the Associated Press cited an estimate of 10 million Copts in Egypt.
In 2015, the Wall Street Journal reported: "The Egyptian government estimates about 5 million Copts, but the Coptic Orthodox Church says 15-18 million.
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