What Is the Biggest Refugee Camp in the World?

The question of the world’s largest refugee camp doesn’t have a single, simple answer. Often, it depends on whether we are talking about a single, organized camp or a sprawling, interconnected settlement. Based on current data from leading humanitarian organizations, the consensus points to the Cox’s Bazar region in Bangladesh as hosting the largest such settlement.

The Complex Reality of “The Biggest”

The sheer size of the world’s largest settlements can be difficult to grasp. The title for the biggest refugee camp is broadly understood to belong to the Kutupalong refugee camp, which is part of a vast network of camps in the Cox’s Bazar district of Bangladesh .

This area is home to more than 1.1 million Rohingya refugees, the vast majority of whom fled a violent military crackdown in Myanmar in 2017 . The settlement has become a city of makeshift shelters sprawling across approximately 24 square kilometers of hilly terrain, an area comparable in size to a major international airport .

Other Major Refugee Settlements

While Cox’s Bazar is widely recognized as the largest, it’s important to note the scale of other major refugee-hosting areas that are sometimes cited for different reasons.

• Kakuma and Kalobeyei, Kenya: These two settlements in northwestern Kenya are often collectively referred to as one of the largest refugee complexes in the world. As of mid-2025, Kakuma and Kalobeyei hosted over 300,000 refugees and asylum-seekers from 25 different nationalities, making it one of the most culturally diverse refugee populations globally .
• Dadaab, Kenya: Another significant complex, Dadaab camp in Kenya, was home to approximately 428,016 refugees as of March 2025 .
• Al Za’atari, Jordan: This camp is a major settlement for Syrian refugees, with a population of around 70,000. While significantly smaller than Cox’s Bazar, it is a massive and well-established camp known for its services, including schools and health centers .

It is also worth noting that different sources, even from the same year, might use slightly different figures as population data is constantly updated. The Palestinian refugee camps in Gaza, also home to over a million people, are often categorized separately by UNRWA . This highlights the complexity of defining and measuring displacement.