Albuquerque Map
Albuquerque lies in a rift valley a mile above sea level, with the Rio Grande through the middle and the Sandia Mountains on the eastern skyline, and held about 560,000 people in 2024.
Where is Albuquerque?
The city occupies the middle of New Mexico, where Interstates 25 and 40 cross — the state's one large urban center in a state of empty distances. Santa Fe, the capital, is 60 miles northeast and 2,000 feet higher. Albuquerque is about 265 miles north of El Paso, roughly 465 road miles east of Phoenix, and some 450 miles southwest of Denver up the Rio Grande corridor and over Raton Pass.
Albuquerque at a glance
| State | New Mexico |
| County | Bernalillo County |
| Population | 560,326 (2024 Census estimate) |
| Rank among US cities | No. 32 of the 100 largest |
| Time zone | Mountain Time |
| Region | West (Mountain division) |
No. 32 on the 2024 list is a margin of 3,205 people: that is how far Albuquerque trails Milwaukee, while Tucson is 6,313 further back. No second New Mexico city reaches the hundred. One city government therefore accounts for about 26% of New Mexico's 2.13 million people. It holds about 83% of Bernalillo County's 671,747 residents.
Albuquerque in New Mexico
Bernalillo County is one of the smallest of New Mexico's 33 counties in area and holds close to a third of the state's people; the New Mexico county map shows how much empty ground the other 32 cover. No other New Mexico city comes near Albuquerque's size — Las Cruces, Rio Rancho and Santa Fe are each a fraction of it. The New Mexico state page takes in the rest, and the capitals map marks Santa Fe rather than this city.
The rift, the river and the Sandias
Albuquerque sits in the Rio Grande rift, a trench where the continental crust is pulling apart — the reason the valley is straight-sided and flat-floored, with volcanoes on the West Mesa and a mountain wall on the east. The Rio Grande runs through the city inside a cottonwood bosque, the one continuous strip of green in the landscape. The Sandia Mountains rise to 10,678 feet at Sandia Crest, about a vertical mile above downtown and counted among the southernmost outliers of the Rocky Mountains. A Spanish villa was founded on the river here in 1706, and the old plaza still marks the spot.
Cities near Albuquerque
Other cities in range: El Paso, Tucson, Phoenix, Colorado Springs and Denver. The Mountain division page covers the interior West.