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The Most Polluted Cities Around the World

If you’re a traveler, where are you most likely to encounter bad air? Where are the most polluted cities in the world, places where it is downright dangerous to your health?

Well, there are some places in the Americas that have some bad air, but they’ve got nothing on the smoking guns of Asia, especially India, with many cities there making Mexico City look like a blue-sky paradise.

most polluted cities India

Back when the pandemic launched shelter at home orders and almost nobody was driving, you could see the Himalayas from Kathmandu and cities in northern India. That didn’t last long though and they’re back to their smoggy selves. You’d have to use some kind of AI image generator to get a photo of a clear sky day with clear snow-capped peaks in the distance. 

If you’re looking for the quick and easy answer of places to avoid, stay out of India. That country has the dubious honor of hosting 83 of the 100 most polluted cities in the world according to a study using data from IQ Air. In another study from an air monitoring company, India had 28 of the top 30 most polluted cities. The only others in there were Dhaka and Peshawar. 

Yes, most of the worst cities for pollution that aren’t in India’s are in the country’s neighbors: Pakistan and Bangladesh. If you have a respiratory condition, South Asia is the worst place on the planet you could go. Depending on the season, China and Southeast Asia can be big trouble too. 

Asia Has Worse Air Pollution Than the Rest of the World

In that study mentioned above, Asia had 99 of the 100 most polluted cities on Earth, almost a shutout. The only city not in Asia was Benoni, South Africa. 

There are plenty of reasons for this in the developing countries of Asia: farmers burning fields each year after harvest, poor regulation of factories’ emmissions, a reliance on dirty fuel like coal, and inefficient engines on vehicles that crank out a lot of air pollution. Anyone who has been to a city in India has seen this first-hand, to the point where some days it’s unhealthy to even walk around outside. 

If you are headed to India, it would be best to severely limit your time in Delhi. As noted in the section below, it is the worst city in the world for air pollution on a regular basis. Kolkata is not far behind, then you’ve got dangerous levels of air pollution in more than 80 others, though thankfully for visitors they’re more likely to be industrial centers you’ve never heard of than the tourist magnets. 

In a way though these reports are not complete. There are some very dirty cities in Africa but since nobody there is actually measuring or reporting on air quality, it’s hard to know how bad they are. Per the report I’ve been using here for data, “Africa remains the most underrepresented continent, with a third of the population still lacking access to air quality data.” In other words, there could be 5 or 10 African cities on the world’s worst, but they’re remaining blissfully ignorant on purpose. 

It is possible that some cities in South America are worse too, but we don’t really know since “70% of the real-time air quality data in the region of Latin America & Caribbean comes from low-cost sensors.”

poor air quality unsafe

The 5 Most Polluted Cities in the World

 According to the last report from IQAir, these are the five cities with the worst air pollution, all of them in South Asia: 

  1. Delhi, India
  2. Lahore, Pakistan
  3. Dhaka, Bangladesh
  4. Karachi, Pakistan
  5. Kolkata, India

Here’s the scary quote that shows the scope of how many people are impacted: 

Over 80 million people live in the five most polluted major cities.

To put that in perspective, if those 80 million people were in one place it would be the 20th largest country in the world, slightly less than Germany and more than Thailand. 

most polluted cities Southeast Asia

Speaking of Thailand though, Bangkok shows up on a lot of most polluted cities lists but in some months of the year it’s far worse than others. These lists are not really static because atmospheric conditions, fires, and heat or lack of rain can all have an impact.

Bangkok got so polluted at one point last year that they offered free public transportation to everyone to try to get people off the roads. This year, the city government is pushing companies to let more people work from home and it is banning gas-powered cars from entering some congested zones (EVs are still allowed in). 

Hanoi, Vietnam is another Southeast Asia city that sometimes tops lists of the most polluted cities: it hit #1 last year for a while. Jakarta ranks high in some months as well.  

In this report from an air monitoring company, India again came out on top though, with Delhi in the top spot and an all-India sweep until you get to #13 Dhaka. 

Pollution levels are not static though, so if you’re wondering why there wasn’t much about China, it’s because the air quality can vary a lot by season. As I write this in the month of January, it is not faring well. All 10 of the top-scoring cities on the real-time report from AQI are in China, with Harbin to Chenzhou. As I’m writing this, the air particulate matters in all of them are 14 times the standard level. 

Next on the list are cities in Macedonia, Russia, and Nigeria. India doesn’t pop in on today’s list until #22. 

smoggy sky

The Most Polluted Countries Overall

Apparently there are places in India where you can take a deep breath without fear because the country itself is not the worst overall: it’s #4. According to AQI, these are the countries with the worst overall pollution: 

  1. Bangladesh
  2. Pakistan
  3. Bahrain
  4. India
  5. Nepal
  6. Kuwait
  7. Egypt
  8. Rwanda
  9. UAE
  10. China

smog in China

Despite the serious pollution in the air and in waterways that China is dealing with, they do have to get some credit for leading the world in the production of clean energy solutions. The U.S. and Europe and doing a lot, but we’ll see how the former fares under the scorched-earth felon who thinks clean air is for sissies. Much of the progress made the past four years will have to be continued by cities, states, and the private sector it looks like. 

For better or worse, China has a lot of hydro power and they’ve built huge solar and wind farms. They’ve invested a fortune in clean infrastructure, like high-speed rail, that the U.S. will never see in my lifetime. India and Pakistan though? They’re a mess and getting worse instead of better. 

In the U.S., some spots are far worse than others. Apart from a few hemmed-in geographic oddities like southern California and Salt Lake City, the most polluted places tend to be the ones where coal-fired power plants are still hanging on. Global warning is having a big impact though, according to the American Lung Association. “Extreme heat, drought and wildfires are contributing to a steady increase in deadly particle pollution, especially in the western U.S.”  

Apart from California and Oregon, you’ve got your industrial heartland around Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, and West Virginia, plus the city that defined urban sprawl—Houston. See the full list here from the American Lung Association.

Want some good news? The countries with the cleanest bill of health according to IQAir are Australia, Estonia, Finland, Grenada, Iceland, Mauritius, and New Zealand.

The cleanest air in the USA according to the American Lung Association is in these five cities: Beloit, WI; Johnson City-Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA; Lincoln-Beatrice, NE; Honolulu, HI; and Wilmington, NC. The IQAir report had Beloit and Las Vegas in its top spots, though if smoke is blowing over from California, it’s a different story in Nevada. (As it is in the Grand Canyon too.) 

Dilions

Tuesday 4th of February 2025

The issue of air pollution is a significant global concern, with certain cities bearing the brunt of hazardous levels of air quality. Cities like New Delhi, Lahore, and Dhaka consistently rank among the most polluted worldwide, where high levels of particulate matter (PM2.5) and toxic gases pose severe health risks. The main contributors to pollution include vehicular emissions, industrial activity, and construction dust.