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  2. Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and financial center of New England, a region of the Northeastern United States. It has an area of 48.4 sq mi and a population of 675,647 as of the 2020 census, making it the third-largest city in the Northeastern United States after New York City and Philadelphia. The larger Greater Boston metropolitan statistical area has a population of 4.9 million as of 2023, making it the largest in New England and the eleventh-largest in the country.
    CountryUnited States
    CountySuffolk
    Etymology

    Isaac Johnson, in one of his last official acts as the leader of the Charlestown community before he died on September 30, 1630, named the then-new settlement across the river "Boston". The settlement's name cam… See more

    History

    Prior to European colonization, the region surrounding present-day Boston was inhabited by the Massachusett people who had small, seasonal communities. When a group of settlers led by John Winthrop arrived in 1… See more

    Geography

    Boston has an area of 89.63 sq mi (232.1 km ). Of this area, 48.4 sq mi (125.4 km ), or 54%, of it is land and 41.2 sq mi (106.7 km ), or 46%, of it is water. The city's elevation, as measured at Logan Internation… See more

    Demographics

    In 2020, Boston was estimated to have 691,531 residents living in 266,724 households —a 12% population increase over 2010. The city is the third-most densely populated large U.S. city of over half a million resi… See more