GA · Fulton County · 498,715 (2020) · 38th-largest US city · state capital
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta lies in the Piedmont of northwest Georgia, on a ridge at the southern end of the Appalachians. It is the capital of Georgia, the largest city in the state and the thirty-eighth in the United States, at the centre of a metro of six million.
- State
- Georgia
- County
- Fulton County (part in DeKalb)
- Population (2020)
- 498,715
- Rank
- 38th in the US
- Coordinates
- 33.75°N, 84.39°W
- Time zone
- Eastern
- Metro area
- about 6.1 million
- State capital
- Yes – capital of Georgia
Where Atlanta is
Atlanta is at 33.75°N, 84.39°W, mostly in Fulton County, of which it is the county seat, with its eastern neighbourhoods in DeKalb County. The city covers about 135 square miles of rolling Piedmont at roughly 1,050 feet above sea level — the highest of the major eastern cities — on the ridge that divides the Chattahoochee basin (flowing to the Gulf) from the Ocmulgee basin (flowing to the Atlantic). It was founded in 1837 as the end of a railroad line, and its name at the time, Terminus, described the site. The Blue Ridge begins 60 miles north; the Atlantic is 250 miles southeast at Savannah. Charlotte is 245 miles northeast and Nashville 250 miles northwest.
Population and rank
The 2020 Census counted 498,715 residents, ranking Atlanta 38th in the US and first in Georgia. The city is small relative to its region: the Atlanta–Sandy Springs–Alpharetta metropolitan area spans 29 counties and has about 6.1 million people, the eighth-largest metro in the country, of which only about 8 percent live inside the city limits — the lowest core share of any large US metro. Atlanta grew about 19 percent between 2010 and 2020 and passed 500,000 in later estimates.
Geography
- Chattahoochee River — flows southwest along the northwest edge of the city and supplies most of its water; it later forms the Georgia–Alabama border and reaches the Gulf as the Apalachicola.
- Eastern Continental Divide — runs through the city along the ridge followed by the railroads and Peachtree Street.
- Stone Mountain — a granite dome 1,686 feet high, 15 miles east of downtown; Kennesaw Mountain lies 20 miles northwest.
- Tree canopy — Atlanta has the densest urban tree cover of any large US city, on red-clay hills of the southern Appalachian Piedmont.
Nearest large cities
Atlanta is the hub of the Southeast; Birmingham, Chattanooga and Greenville are within two and a half hours, and the cities below within about four. Distances are approximate road miles from the Capitol.
| City | State | Road distance (mi) | Direction |
|---|---|---|---|
| Charlotte | NC | 245 | NE |
| Nashville | TN | 250 | NW |
| Jacksonville | FL | 345 | SE |
| Memphis | TN | 385 | NW |
| Louisville | KY | 420 | N |
Atlanta as state capital
Atlanta became Georgia's capital in 1868, during Reconstruction, replacing Milledgeville; earlier capitals had been Savannah, Augusta and Louisville, Georgia. The gold-domed Capitol was completed in 1889. Atlanta is both the capital and the largest city in the state and by metro population its region is the largest of any state capital. See the Atlanta capital page for the capitol and the sequence of earlier capitals.
Related maps
- Georgia map — the state with its 159 counties, the most after Texas.
- Atlanta, state capital — capital facts and history.
- US cities map.
- Appalachian Mountains map.
- Nearby cities: Charlotte, Nashville, Jacksonville.
- Southeast region · Eastern Time Zone.