Region of France

Pays de la Loire

Pays de la Loire is a region of France. It covers about 32,100 km² (12,400 mi²), the 8th largest of the 18 regions in Natural Earth’s file for France, and about the same size as Guinea-Bissau. About 3.9 million people live there (Wikidata, 2022).

In area0.98×the size ofGuinea-Bissau32,800 km² In people1.00×as many people asCroatia3.9 million

100 km

Guinea-Bissau
Pays de la Loire

Facts

Area, measured	32,100 km²12,400 mi²
Official area	32,100 km²Wikidata · agrees with our measure
Share of France	5.0%of the area of the 18 regions
Rank by area	8th of 18regions of France
Population	3.9 millionWikidata, 2022
Density	121 people per km²
Capital	Nantes
Latitude range	46°N to 49°N
Type	RegionFR-PDL

What the numbers say about Pays de la Loire

Pays de la Loire covers 5.0% of the area of France and ranks 8th of 18 by both area and population.
It would take 19.8 regions the size of Pays de la Loire to cover France.
The largest, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, is 2.65× the size of Pays de la Loire; the smallest, Mayotte, is 1.2% of it.
Closest in size within France: Hauts-de-France (32,000 km², 1.00×) and Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (31,300 km², 1.03×).
Counted as a country, Pays de la Loire would be larger than 100 of the 239 countries and territories listed on sizeversus, and would rank 140th by area, between Guinea-Bissau (32,800 km²) and Belgium (30,700 km²).
With 3.9 million people it would rank 131st of 238 by population.
Pays de la Loire has 121 people per km², about the density of Benin, which has 122 per km².
That makes Pays de la Loire the 9th most densely populated of the 18 regions, 1.13× the average for France (107 per km²).
On a standard web map (Web Mercator), a place at 47°N is drawn about 2.2× too large in area, so Pays de la Loire looks bigger there than it is.
Laid out flat, Pays de la Loire stretches about 254 km north to south and 259 km east to west.
Wikidata's official figure of 32,100 km² agrees with our measured area of 32,100 km², to within 2%.

About the same size as

About as many people as

Beside the regions of other countries

The closest region by area and by people in each of the other countries that have regional pages here, within a factor of 2. All 395 regions side by side.

Where Pays de la Loire ranks

Pays de la Loire is the 8th largest of the 18 regions of France.

Ranked within France

All 18 regions of France, matched to countries

Compare Pays de la Loire

Sources and method

Outline: Natural Earth, 1:10m Admin 1 - States, Provinces, public domain: the 5 departments of this region in the file, joined along their shared borders.
Boundary: De facto, as drawn by Natural Earth.
Area: Measured on the WGS84 ellipsoid from the full-detail outline, shown rounded. The region’s whole area is counted, every island included.
Official figures: Area, population and capital from Wikidata (CC0), fetched 2026-11-12
Population: Wikidata, 2022. France’s units share the 2022 figures where Wikidata has them; the year is shown wherever the figure is.
Matching: Countries come from Natural Earth’s country file. Places whose status is contested and dependencies are never used as automatic matches. A region under 2,500 km² is matched against the small countries and island nations.
Data built: 2026-11-12

Full method