Direct answer: Most people in South America live in urban areas, with the largest concentrations in major cities and their metropolitan regions, especially in Brazil (notably São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro), Colombia (notably Bogotá and Medellín), Argentina (Buenos Aires), and Chile (Santiago) where large urban agglomerations dominate population distribution. Overall, South America is highly urbanized, but precise figures vary by year and source.
Context and details:
- Population spread is heavily skewed toward cities and metropolitan areas rather than rural zones, driven by economic activity, services, and infrastructure concentrated in urban cores.
- Brazil contains the continent’s largest urban populations, with São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro forming vast metropolitan belts that house tens of millions collectively.
- Other large urban centers include Bogotá, Lima, Santiago, and Buenos Aires, which together account for sizable shares of their country populations and the regional totals.
- Global population distribution data commonly show Brazil as the most populous country in the region, followed by Colombia and Argentina, with urbanization at high levels in most countries.
If you’d like, I can pull the latest country-by-country urbanization rates and city population counts to give a sharper, year-specific picture.
