Riyadh

Riyadh

Riyadh (/riːˈjɑːd/,[5] Arabic: الرياض, romanized: 'ar-Riyāḍ, lit.: 'The Meadows' [ar.riˈjaːdˤ] Najdi pronunciation: [er.rɪˈjɑːðˤ]) is the capital and largest city of Saudi Arabia.[6] It is also the capital of the Riyadh Province and the centre of the Riyadh Governorate. The current form of the metropolis emerged as an offshoot of the eponymous walled town following the dismantling of its defensive fortifications in the 1950s, after which the city underwent several phases of expansion and urbanization. It is the largest city on the Arabian Peninsula, and is situated in the center of the an-Nafud desert, on the eastern part of the Najd plateau. The city sits at an average of 600 meters (2,000 ft) above sea level,[7] and receives around 5 million tourists each year, making it the forty-ninth most visited city in the world and the 6th in the Middle East. Riyadh had a population of 7.0 million people in 2022, making it the most-populous city in Saudi Arabia, 3rd most populous in the Middle East, and the 38th most populous in Asia.[8]