You read it right: the city with the most Neapolitans in the world may not be Naples! The primacy, in fact, would belong to Saint Paulin Brazil, followed by Buenos Aires (Argentina). But is it really like that?
There are several online newspapers – mostly local – that report this news: the Campania capital, among other things, would only be in fourth place, after the city of Rio de Janeiro, always in Brazil. A study conducted by an American institute, the “Demographic”.
In this new column of fact-checkinglet’s try to understand if this news is authentic by verifying the primary sources and consulting the (alleged) original source.
The analysis: the entity Demographic it doesn’t exist and there’s no trace of the search online
In reality, the first thing that stands out is precisely the fact that it is impossible to find the American institute Demographic, cited as the author of the study on which the news is based. In the United States, in fact, there is no research body with this name: there are institutes that deal with demographic research, such as US Census Bureau ol’Institute for Demographic Research, and that within their archives they do not have any type of investigation on the distribution of people of Neapolitan origin in the world.
Among other things, the data from this hypothetical investigation could be partially altered, given that they would take into account almost exclusively the number of descendants of the Neapolitans, many of whom, perhaps, have never even seen Naples.
On this point it must be said that, in fact, the second half of the 19th century began mass migrations of Italians: as also reported on the website of the Chamber of Deputies, between 1861 (the year of the Unification of Italy) and the 1980s over 29 million Italians emigrated, many of them headed towards Argentina, Brazil or other neighboring countries. For this reason, the fact that the first three cities of this phantom ranking are located right in South America, makes everything a little more likely.
Italians, however, are still a population of emigrants: according to the “Italians in the World 2025 Report”, as of 1 January 2025 the Italians registered in the AIRE (Registry of Italians Resident Abroad) were 6,412,752 million. And if theArgentina it is the foreign country in which they live more Italiansthe Brazilian city of Saint Paul maintains a strong bond with Naples, to the point that every year it is celebrated Feast of San Gennaro with processions taking place mainly in the Mooca district.
The conclusion of the fact-checking: the news is not verifiable
So, what’s the bottom line on this fact-checking? The news it is not verifiable going back to the primary sources, i.e. the original sources that are cited in the news (in this case the institution’s study Demographic). And this happens for two main reasons: first of all, because there is no trace of this research, as the entity that would have created it did not exist.
But, above all, why There are no official databases to directly compare the number of inhabitants of Naples – approximately 905,000 – with the number of people of Neapolitan origin living in the rest of the world. Otherwise, we could have created a ranking ourselves, based on official sources. It is true that there isAIREthe official register of all Italians residing abroad, but it is a list which, by its nature, includes people who come from every part of Italy. In short, it is almost impossible to trace such specific data, especially if we consider that the names and origins of the AIRE members they are not publicfor clear privacy reasons.
Probably, therefore, it is one fake news: Nonetheless, the news could be considered authentic by readers, precisely because likely. If, in fact, the presumed ranking had brought cities like Bangkok or Copenhagen back to the top, perhaps the news would have lost credibility right away. And, instead, the very presence of South American cities – where numerous descendants of Italian emigrants actually live – has made everything more realistic, even if the classification presumably remains fake.
