The population of Latvia (2001 estimate) is about 2,385,231, yielding an average population density of 37 persons per sq km (97 per sq mi). Latvia is highly urbanized. Some 74 percent of the population lives in urban areas, with nearly one-third of the total population residing in Riga. Other important cities include Daugavpils, an industrial center; and Liepaja, a seaport with an ice-free harbor. Numerous towns and small cities are located along the country’s rivers, waterways, and coastal areas.

In the early 1990s Latvians made up little more than half of the total population, down from three-quarters before the Soviet occupation in 1940. During the Soviet period, immigration was far more significant than natural increase in accounting for population growth. Immigrants to Latvia were principally Russians and other Slavs. Irrespective of ethnic background, birth rates were low; indeed, they were insufficient to ensure population replacement. With independence and the emergence of administrative controls over immigration from Russia and other parts of the former U.S.S.R., a major challenge was to offset the aging of the whole population, a serious problem even before independence. Data from the 1980s indicate that Latvians were choosing to have larger families than in the past and larger families than the Slavic segment of the population. It was hoped that this tendency, combined with restrictions on immigration, would arrest the decline in the Latvian share of the population.