Favelas e comunidades urbanas: Um em cada doze paulistas, quase todos na metrópole e no litoral

Cerejo, Lucas Nakamura

doi:10.5281/zenodo.23540523

No. 067 Census · income Favelas and urban communities 1/4

Favelas and urban communities

One in twelve people in São Paulo, nearly all in the metropolis and on the coast

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Map of São Paulo’s municipalities in six shades, from cream to dark brown, by the share of the population living in favelas and urban communities. Greater São Paulo and the Santos coast are dark brown; the interior, mostly without favelas, is grey, with pale patches in mid-sized towns. Callouts point to the capital, with 1.73 million residents in 1,363 favelas and communities, and Guarujá, with 37% of its population in favelas. In the panel, the share of the state’s favela residents in each class, the municipalities with the largest share of population in favelas and those with most favela residents outside the capital. — Fig. 067 São Paulo State (SP) EPSG:4674 Source: IBGE

In 2022, 3.63 million people in São Paulo lived in tracts that IBGE classed as Favelas and Urban Communities: 8.2% of the population, one in twelve. There are 3,136 favelas and communities in 92 of the 645 municipalities. The capital has 1.73 million residents in them, nearly half the state’s total, in 1,363 communities: 15% of the city. By share of population, the coast leads: in Guarujá, 37% of residents live in favelas; in Cubatão, 33%; in São Sebastião, 30%. Outside the capital, the town with most people in favelas is Guarulhos, with 216,000, ahead of São Bernardo do Campo and Campinas. Inland, the exception is Campinas, with 12% of its population in favelas; in Ribeirão Preto it is 3%, in Sorocaba 2%. First plate of the collection “Favelas and urban communities”.

Technical record · downloads · citation

At a glance

Layers

setores_fcu polygon 8,008 tracts in Favelas and Urban Communities: community code and name, municipality, people and occupied households
municipios polygon 645 municipalities: people, people in favelas, number of communities, population share, surroundings and income inside and outside
regioes_intermediarias polygon 11 intermediate geographic regions
limite_estadual polygon State boundary

Metadata

Sources: IBGE — 2022 Population Census: census tract aggregates (basic characteristics), with the Favelas and Urban Communities identifier (2022)
IBGE — 2022 Census Tract Mesh (2022)
IBGE — Municipal Mesh 2025 (2025)
Extent: São Paulo State (SP)
CRS / Projection: SIRGAS 2000 (EPSG:4674)
EPSG:4674
Software: Node.js · d3-geo · QGIS
Method: People in census tracts coded as a Favela or Urban Community over all people in each municipality, from the 2022 Census tract aggregates, in six classes; municipalities with no recorded favela shown apart.
Version: v1.0.0
Licence: CC BY 4.0
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.23540523

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The map without a frame, with legend, scale, reference system and credit written on it: ready for papers, lectures and slides. In two versions: with the basemap (neighbours and sea) or only the mapped area, on white.

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How to cite

Cerejo, L. N. (2026). Favelas e comunidades urbanas: um em cada doze paulistas, quase todos na metrópole e no litoral [Favelas and urban communities: One in twelve people in São Paulo, nearly all in the metropolis and on the coast] (Version 1.0.0) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23540523

@dataset{cerejo2026_favelas_sp,
  author    = {Cerejo, Lucas Nakamura},
  title     = {Favelas e comunidades urbanas: Um em cada doze paulistas, quase todos na metrópole e no litoral},
  year      = {2026},
  publisher = {Zenodo},
  version   = {1.0.0},
  doi       = {10.5281/zenodo.23540523},
  url       = {https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23540523},
  language  = {portuguese},
  note      = {English title: Favelas and urban communities: One in twelve people in São Paulo, nearly all in the metropolis and on the coast. Licence CC BY 4.0}
}

How to read this plate area, projection, scale, legend and source · 3 terms

1 Area: São Paulo State (SP) The area the plate covers. Outside it, neighbours and sea are drawn in grey, just for orientation.
2 Coordinates and projection: SIRGAS 2000 (EPSG:4674) The layers are in SIRGAS 2000; the drawing’s projection is written in the colophon at the foot of the panel.
3 Scale: Graphic scale bar in the panel The scale bar is true on the central meridian; away from it, measured distances vary a little.
4 Legend and layers: 4 layers in the GeoPackage · polygon Read the legend before the map: it tells you whether a colour is a rate or a class, and whether a circle is a total.
5 Sources: IBGE (2022); IBGE (2025) Every figure comes from a public source, with its year. The data sheet gives each one’s address.

Terms on this plate

Census tract: The smallest collection area of the IBGE Census, a few hundred households each. It is the finest grain at which income, sanitation and housing can be seen without identifying anyone.
Favelas and urban communities: The name IBGE adopted in 2024 in place of “subnormal agglomerations”: low-income housing areas with insecure tenure and incomplete public services.
2022 Census: IBGE’s door-to-door count. Results by census tract give residents, age, household-head income, water, sewerage and rubbish.

Anatomy of a plate Full glossary

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Layers, table and figures, under CC BY 4.0. Cite with the DOI.

Full record and citation

Method notes · No. 067

Favelas and Urban Communities in São Paulo’s municipalities

Português · English

Plate No. 067, the first of four in the collection Favelas and urban communities. The communities, one by one, are on plate 068.

What the files contain

Layer (GPKG)	Geometry	Content
`setores_fcu`	polygon	8,008 tracts: `CD_SETOR`, `CD_FCU`, `NM_FCU` (community code and name), `CD_MUN`, `NM_MUN`, `pessoas`, `dppo` (occupied permanent private households)
`municipios`	polygon	645 municipalities: `pessoas`, `pessoas_fcu`, `setores_fcu`, `n_fcu`, `pct_fcu`; the surroundings of plate 069 (`sem_iluminacao`, `sem_pavimentacao`, `sem_calcada` and others) and the income of plate 070 (`renda_media_dentro`, `renda_media_fora`, `razao_renda`)
`regioes_intermediarias`, `limite_estadual`	polygon	reference

The GPKG is the same for all four plates, with each one’s QGIS style (pct_fcu, sem_iluminacao, sem_pavimentacao, sem_calcada and the tract style). The CSV has the municipal table, without geometry.

Method

2022 Census tract aggregates: a tract in a Favela or Urban Community carries the community’s code (CD_FCU) and name; each tract belongs to one community only.
People in favelas = sum of people in those tracts; share = over all people in the municipality, in six classes closed on the right: up to 2%, 2 to 5%, 5 to 10%, 10 to 15%, 15 to 20% and over 20%.
The 553 municipalities with no tract in a favela are grey.

Limitations

The favela is IBGE’s: areas of low-income housing with insecure tenure and missing or poor services, infrastructure or urbanisation. Irregular subdivisions and tenements outside those areas are left out, and each city hall’s criteria may give different counts.
Communities follow tract boundaries: a small favela inside a larger tract may not have been delineated.
The municipal map paints the whole area in one colour; favelas take up only a small part of each, as plate 068 shows.

View this map’s folder on GitHub