Countries
Key facts
- Capital
- San Salvador
- Region
- Americas, Central America
- Population
- 6,365,503 (2025)
- Area
- 21,040 km²
- Currency
- United States dollar (USD)
- Languages
- Spanish
- Calling code
- +503
- Internet domain
- .sv
- ISO codes
- SV, SLV, 222
- Time zone
- UTC-6:00
- United Nations
- Member state
- Postal code pattern
- CP #### (# = digit, @ = letter)
Land and position
El Salvador covers about 21,040 square kilometres. By area it ranks 154th among the 250 countries and territories on this site. It is a little smaller than Belize and a little larger than Israel. It shares a land border with 2 neighbours: Guatemala, Honduras. Its centre lies at about 14° north, 89° west, in the northern hemisphere.
Neighbours
People
About 6.37 million people live in El Salvador (World Bank, 2025). That makes it the 113th most populous of the 246 places on this site with a figure. On average there are 303 people to each square kilometre. About 76 percent of people live in towns and cities (World Bank, 2025). A baby born there can expect to live about 72 years (World Bank, 2024). Languages listed for it: Spanish. A person from El Salvador is called Salvadoran.
Money and economy
The currency is the United States dollar (code USD, symbol $). It is also the main currency of American Samoa, British Indian Ocean Territory, British Virgin Islands, Caribbean Netherlands, Ecuador, Guam, Marshall Islands, Northern Mariana Islands and 7 more. The World Bank puts the size of its economy (GDP) at about US$ 36.7 billion (2025), which is about US$ 5,767 for each person (2025).
Time
El Salvador uses one time zone, UTC-6:00 (America/El Salvador). Clocks stay the same all year: there is no daylight saving time.
Time now: loading
Offsets are for January 2026. See Time Zones for a converter.
Largest cities
| City | People |
|---|---|
| San Salvador | 525,990 |
| Soyapango | 329,708 |
| San Miguel | 247,126 |
| Santa Ana | 176,661 |
| Mejicanos | 160,317 |
| Santa Tecla | 124,694 |
City figures are from GeoNames and count the city itself, not the wider urban area. They can be some years old, so use them to see the order of size.
More in Central America
Belize, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Panama. See the whole region.
Figures were collected on 11 November 2026 from the World Bank, GeoNames and the open countries data set. See About and data sources. Borders and names follow those sources and do not express any view on disputed territory.