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City guide · Sweden
Fourteen islands, at the point where Lake Mälaren empties into the Baltic — that is the whole plan of Stockholm, and it is why getting anywhere here means crossing a bridge. Over 30% of the city is water and roughly another 30% is park and green space, which leaves far less built ground than 996,264 residents (2025) across 188 km² would suggest. The medieval core, Gamla stan, stands on the central island and was built up from the mid-13th century onward. Beyond the municipality the urban area holds 1,617,407 people and the metropolitan area 2,480,063.
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Gamla stan is Stockholm's old town, and until 1980 its official name was Staden mellan broarna, the town between the bridges, which describes what a visitor walks into better than old town does.
Kungliga slottet, the Royal Palace of Stockholm, stands at the northern edge of Gamla Stan on the rock where Birger Jarl is recorded as having built a fortress in the mid-thirteenth century.
Stockholms stadshus is the working seat of Stockholm's city government, not a museum that happens to look municipal.
Drottningholm sits on the island of Lovon in Ekero Municipality, about ten kilometres west of central Stockholm, and it is a working royal home as well as a monument.
Source: OpenStreetMap contributors, Wikidata ·
Set your days, your pace and the hours you actually want to be out. The planner works around closing days and travel time, and leaves room to eat.
