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Jakarta, capital of Indonesia: facts and figures

Jakarta is the capital of Indonesia. It has about 11,200,000 residents, which makes it the 11th most populous capital of the 172 in DailyGeo's atlas, and it sits 14 m above sea level. Its nearest neighbouring capital is Singapore, 905 km away.

Key figures

FigureValue
CountryIndonesia
ContinentAsia
City population11,200,000 residents
World rank by population11th of 172
Elevation14 m
Founded1527
Time zoneAsia/Jakarta
Coordinates6.21° S, 106.85° E
Country population285,721,236 residents
Country GDP1.4 trillion US dollars
GDP per capita$5,060
Life expectancy71.3 years
Internet users72.8 %
Big Mac priceIDR 43,000 (about $2.38)

Climate through the year

Jakarta averages 27.1 °C from June to August and 26.4 °C from December to February. February is the coldest month of the year and September the warmest, and the city receives 2,271 mm of precipitation in an average year.

Monthly means from ERA5 reanalysis, 2015 to 2024.
MonthMean temperature
January26.3 °C
February26.1 °C
March26.6 °C
April26.9 °C
May27.2 °C
June26.9 °C
July27.0 °C
August27.4 °C
September27.6 °C
October27.6 °C
November27.1 °C
December26.7 °C

What makes it stand out

  • Winter: 3rd mildest capital in Asia (27.1 °C).
  • Latitude: southernmost capital in Asia (6.21°).
  • Prices: 2nd cheapest capital for a Big Mac in the world ($2.38).

Nearest capitals

Distances are great-circle distances between city centres, which is what the Capitals game measures when it tells you how far a guess was from the answer. Singapore is the closest capital to Jakarta.

CapitalCountryDistance
SingaporeSingapore905 km
Kuala LumpurMalaysia1,187 km
Bandar Seri BegawanBrunei1,526 km
Phnom PenhCambodia1,987 km
BangkokThailand2,329 km

How to remember it

Reading a figure once rarely fixes it in memory. Attach Jakarta to a place and a number you already know: it is 905 km from Singapore, and it is the 11th largest capital in the atlas. Then practise retrieving it. DailyGeo Capitals gives you one mystery capital a day with distance, direction, language and population clues, the memorising method explains the review schedule, and the capitals index lists all 172.

To see how Indonesia compares with every other country on figures like these, the most expensive Big Mac index ranks them on geopolitix, a country-ranking game by the same maker as DailyGeo.

Sources

  • City population and coordinates: DailyGeo's own game data, the same figures the Capitals game plays with. Population follows the urban area rather than the commune, which is why no density is quoted.
  • Temperature and rainfall: ten-year means (2015 to 2024) computed from ERA5 reanalysis, retrieved through Open-Meteo. Hersbach, H., et al. (2020). The ERA5 global reanalysis. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society.
  • Elevation: terrain height at the city's coordinates in the Copernicus DEM, read through Open-Meteo rather than taken from a curated claim.
  • Time zone: resolved from the same coordinates.
  • Country figures: the World Bank, latest reported year for each series: Country GDP, GDP per capita, Country population, Life expectancy, Internet users.
  • Big Mac price: The Economist's Big Mac index, from its published dataset. The index covers about 55 economies, so most capitals here have no figure.
  • Founding date: Wikidata, earliest recorded founding claim.
  • This capital elsewhere: Wikipedia, UNdata, Wikidata.
  • Method and limits: How this data was collected explains how each figure was collected and what it does not cover.

The short answer

Jakarta is the capital of Indonesia, in Asia, with about 11,200,000 residents, averaging 27.1 °C from June to August and 26.4 °C from December to February.

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Frequently asked questions

What is the capital of Indonesia?

Jakarta is the capital of Indonesia. It has about 11,200,000 residents and lies in Asia.

How many people live in Jakarta?

About 11,200,000, which ranks Jakarta 11th of the 172 capitals in DailyGeo's atlas by city population.

What is the weather like in Jakarta?

Jakarta averages 27.1 °C from June to August and 26.4 °C from December to February, with 2,271 mm of precipitation a year. These are ten-year means from ERA5 reanalysis.

How expensive is Jakarta?

A Big Mac costs IDR 43,000 (about $2.38) there. GDP per capita in the country is $5,060, the latest year the World Bank reports.

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