Populated places in Estonia (officially: settlement units[a]), are cities or settlement units of rural municipalities, but only cities have administrative functions. Settlement units are divided into settlements[b] and urban regions[c] (subdivisions of cities).
Officially there are four types of settlement unit in Estonia:[1]
village (Estonian: küla) - a sparsely populated settlement or a densely populated settlement with fewer than 300 permanent inhabitants
township (Estonian: alevik) - a densely populated settlement with at least 300 permanent inhabitants
town (Estonian: alev) - a densely populated settlement with at least 1000 permanent inhabitants
city (Estonian: linn)
As of 2024, there were 47 cities, 13 towns, 186 hamlets and 4457 villages in Estonia.[2]
