Paris is the capital and most populous city of France, with an area of 105 square kilometres (41 square miles) and a population of 2.206.488. With 200.000 inhabitants in 1328, Paris, then already the capital of France, was the most populous city of Europe. By comparison, London in 1300 had 80.000 inhabitants. Since the 17th century, Paris has been one of Europe's major centres of finance, commerce, fashion, science, music, and painting.
The Paris Region had a GDP of €681 billion (US$850 billion) in 2016, accounting for 31 per cent of the GDP of France. In 2013-14, the Paris Region had the third-highest GDP in the world and the largest regional GDP in the EU. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit Worldwide Cost of Living Survey in 2018, Paris was the second-most expensive city in the world, behind Singapore and ahead of Zurich, Hong Kong, Oslo and Geneva.
The City of Paris's administrative limits form and East-West oval centred on the island at its historical heart, the Ile de La Citè; this island is near the top of an arc of the river Seine that divides the city into southern Rive Gauche (Left Bank) and northern Rive Droite regions. Paris is the core of a built-up area that extendes well beyond its limits: commonly reterred to as theagglomeration Parisienne, and statistically as aunite urbaine (a measure of urban area), the Paris agglomeration's 2013 population of 10.601.122 made it the largest urban area in the European Union, City-influenced commuter activity reaches well beyond even this in a statistical aire urbaine de Paris (a measure of metropolitan area), that had a 2013 population of 12.405.426, a number one-fith the population of France, the largest metropolitan area in the Eurozone.
