Detroit’s population grew for the second year in a row, according to new estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau.
Detroit’s population grew to reach 645,705 residents in 2024 compared with 638,914 in the 2023 estimate. In May 2024, the census initially reported that Detroit’s population was 633,218 for the year 2023. But the bureau, as of May 15, corrected the 2023 total to 638,914. The latest gains were attributed to an increase of 6,791 Detroiters in 2024 alone, and the addition of 5,696 residents from 2021 to 2023, which the bureau acknowledged had not been included in the population estimates, according to the city. That means 12,487 additional residents have been counted between 2021 and 2024.
“For the first time since the 1950s, the mayor of Detroit can say that the city of Detroit is leading the population growth in the state of Michigan. In 2024 our population growth exceeded the national average,” Mayor Mike Duggan said in a May 15 announcement.
The latest figures place Detroit as the 26th largest city in the nation, ranking behind cities such as Boston and Las Vegas, and ahead of Memphis and Baltimore. Duggan’s administration previously fought the bureau’s population count of Detroit and sued the bureau in federal court multiple times on claims it undercounted the city’s population using demolitions of abandoned structures, dismissing the rehabilitation of vacant homes and construction of new homes.
Between 2021 and 2022, Detroit demolished 4,000 homes, which the bureau calculated as a population loss of 8,000 residents, counting a loss of two residents per demolished structure. Duggan emphasized the city has been adding and renovating an abundance of housing, citing at least 2,000 homes being restored each year.
“They actually revised their national policy twice a year ago. They revised it to stop counting demolitions against us. They were counting every demolition (as) there’s two people leaving the city. We got that fixed a year ago,” Duggan said. “Then this year, changed the policy to get credit for renovated houses, and we got one more policy changes for next year.”
That policy is the “county cap” rule, which determines numbers based on population estimates of all towns and cities within the county and cannot exceed the county’s population estimate, even if Detroit is growing. Duggan added that the Census Bureau counts states, counties and cities using different methodology, which can provide different figures.
“We are litigating it, and we are going to win,” Duggan said. “If you use the housing unit method for the cities, and didn’t deduct the so-called county cap, we would be 10 or 20,000 higher than we are today. The question of whether they should be reducing the number of people per house, that’s what they do. They artificially reduce the number of people per house if we get above the rest of the county. It isn’t right.”
Last year, the bureau released estimates showing population growth, which Duggan previously said was the news he waited on for 10 years after staking his mayoral success on the ability to grow Detroit’s population.
The national growth rate was less than 1% in 2024, but Detroit’s gains reached 1.1%, according to an analysis through Data Driven Detroit; its founder, Kurt Metzger, previously told the Free Press that, based on the city’s housing-related numbers, the population may have been closer to 650,000 in 2020.
“We had a very problematic census in 2020. I feel we got slammed. We got undercounted. The process was poorly done. It was rushed,” Metzger said. “Unfortunately, we had to live with the low count that we received, and we continued to see losses for the two years after the census … finally, last year, we saw that first hit.”
Northwest Detroit resident John George, who runs Detroit Blight Busters, supported Duggan’s announcement on May 15 and said he is working to build 48 units of affordable housing in Old Redford to bring in residents near their community center.
“We’re most definitely seeing the fruits of our labor, to say the very least, and we are going to continue to stabilize and revitalize that community and create some opportunity and hope,” George said.
Duggan also praised developer Richard Hosey, who attended his announcement, for building more than 400 housing units at the Fisher Body Plant. Hosey said he had opportunities to develop properties in multiple cities, but ultimately, Detroit is better.
“We’re better than those cities for so many reasons, but mostly because of our commitment to making sure that we don’t grow through displacement, and that we focus on the neighborhoods and that we make sure there’s opportunity for all,” Hosey said. “I wouldn’t want to be any other place. I wouldn’t develop any other place, and this is the best thing.”
Dana Afana is the Detroit city hall reporter for the Free Press. Contact: dafana@freepress.com. Follow her: @DanaAfana.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit population grows for 2nd straight year after periods of decline, Census data shows
Reporting by Dana Afana, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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