South Italy

For the territory and its history, see Southern Italy. For the EU constituency, see Southern Italy (European Parliament constituency).

South Italy Italia meridionale (Italian) Sud Italia (Italian)
Country	Italy
Regions	List Abruzzo Apulia Basilicata Calabria Campania Molise
Area
• Total	73,223 km2 (28,272 sq mi)
Population  (2025) [1]
• Total	13,367,631
• Density	180/km2 (470/sq mi)
Languages
– Official language	Italian
– Official linguistic minorities [2]	Arbëresh Calabrian Greek Griko dialect Serbo-Croatian
– Regional languages	Neapolitan

South Italy (Italian : Italia meridionale or Sud Italia) is one of the five official statistical regions of Italy used by the National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT), a first level NUTS region and a European Parliament constituency. South Italy encompasses six of the country's 20 regions:

• Abruzzo
• Apulia
• Basilicata
• Calabria
• Campania
• Molise

South Italy is defined only for statistical and electoral purposes. It should not be confused with the Mezzogiorno, or Southern Italy, which refers to the areas of the former Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (once including the southern half of the Italian peninsula and Sicily) with the usual addition of the Western Mediterranean island of Sardinia. The latter and Sicily form a distinct statistical region, called Insular Italy.

Geography

South Italy borders central Italy to the northwest, while it is washed by the Adriatic Sea to the northeast, the Ionian Sea to the southeast and the Tyrrhenian Sea to the southwest.

The territory of South Italy is predominantly hilly and mountainous. The largest plains are the Tavoliere delle Puglie (second largest plain on the Italian peninsula), the Tavoliere salentino, the Campania plain, the Sele plain, the Metaponto plain, the Sibari plain and the Gioia Tauro plain. It is crossed from north to south by the Apennine Mountains, whose highest mountain is the Gran Sasso d'Italia (2,912 m or 9,554 ft).

Demography

South Italy has 13,367,631 inhabitants as of 2025. ^[1]

Historical population

Year	Pop.	±%
1861	6,614,467	—
1871	6,983,465	+5.6%
1881	7,417,653	+6.2%
1901	8,297,080	+11.9%
1911	8,821,151	+6.3%
1921	9,341,451	+5.9%
1931	9,799,622	+4.9%
1936	10,243,425	+4.5%
1951	11,922,652	+16.4%
1961	12,435,638	+4.3%
1971	12,719,751	+2.3%
1981	13,552,281	+6.5%
1991	13,922,850	+2.7%
2001	13,914,865	−0.1%
2011	13,977,431	+0.4%
2021	13,512,083	−3.3%
Source: ISTAT [3] [4]

Regions

Region	Capital	Inhabitants	Area (km²)	Density (inh/km²)
Abruzzo	L'Aquila	1,268,430	10,763	117
Apulia	Bari	3,874,166	19,358	200
Basilicata	Potenza	529,897	9,995	53
Calabria	Catanzaro	1,832,147	15,222	120
Campania	Naples	5,575,025	13,671	407
Molise	Campobasso	287,966	4,438	64

Most populous municipalities

Naples

Bari

Taranto

Reggio Calabria

Foggia

Below is the list of the most populous municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants: ^[5]

#	Municipality	Region	Inhabitants
1	Naples	Campania	908,082
2	Bari	Apulia	315,473
3	Taranto	Apulia	185,909
4	Reggio Calabria	Calabria	168,572
5	Foggia	Apulia	145,477
6	Salerno	Campania	125,958
7	Giugliano in Campania	Campania	124,633
8	Pescara	Abruzzo	118,419
9	Andria	Apulia	96,607
10	Lecce	Apulia	94,253
11	Barletta	Apulia	92,010
12	Catanzaro	Calabria	83,247
13	Brindisi	Apulia	81,664
14	Torre del Greco	Campania	79,294
15	Pozzuoli	Campania	75,192
16	Corigliano-Rossano	Calabria	74,002
17	Casoria	Campania	73,491
18	Caserta	Campania	72,632
19	L'Aquila	Abruzzo	70,421
20	Altamura	Apulia	70,094
21	Lamezia Terme	Calabria	67,168
22	Potenza	Basilicata	63,839
23	Cosenza	Calabria	63,241
24	Castellammare di Stabia	Campania	62,157
25	Afragola	Campania	61,449
26	Matera	Basilicata	59,586
27	Acerra	Campania	58,535
28	Crotone	Calabria	58,181
29	Marano di Napoli	Campania	57,639
30	Molfetta	Apulia	57,147
31	Cerignola	Apulia	56,941
32	Benevento	Campania	55,645
33	Trani	Apulia	54,751
34	Montesilvano	Abruzzo	53,556
35	Bisceglie	Apulia	53,362
36	Manfredonia	Apulia	53,288
37	Bitonto	Apulia	52,915
38	Avellino	Campania	51,910
39	Teramo	Abruzzo	51,539
40	Portici	Campania	51,351

Economy

The gross domestic product (GDP) of the region was 271.1 billion euro in 2018, accounting for 15.4% of Italy's economic output. The GDP per capita adjusted for purchasing power was 19,300 euro, or 64% of the EU27 average in the same year. ^[6]

See also

• Italy portal

• National Institute of Statistics (Italy)
• NUTS statistical regions of Italy
• Italian NUTS level 1 regions:
  • Northwest Italy
  • Northeast Italy
  • Insular Italy
• Northern Italy
• Central Italy
• Southern Italy

References

1. "Monthly Demographic Balance". ISTAT.
2. "Legge 482". Webcitation.org. Archived from the original on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
3. "Popolazione residente e presente dei comuni. Censimenti dal 1861 al 1971" [Resident and present population of the municipalities. Censuses from 1861 to 1971](PDF) (in Italian). ISTAT. 24 October 1971.
4. "Dashboard Permanent census of population and housing". ISTAT.
6. "Regional GDP per capita ranged from 30% to 263% of the EU average in 2018". Eurostat.