Ndola

Also known as NoliNoli

Ndola is the third largest city in Zambia in terms of size and population, with a population of 627,503 (2022 census), after the capital, Lusaka, and Kitwe, and the second largest in terms of infrastructure development after Lusaka. It is the industrial and commercial center of the Copperbelt, Zambia's copper-mining region, and capital of Copperbelt Province. It lies just from the border with DR Congo. It is also home to Zambia's first modern stadium, the Levy Mwanawasa Stadium. thumb|A sign on the T3 road (Zambia)|T3 road depicting Ndola as The Friendly City

OverviewAI-generated

Ndola is a city in Zambia that serves as the capital of Copperbelt Province. Established in 1904, the municipality is situated at an elevation of approximately 1,300 meters above sea level. It operates within the UTC+02:00 time zone and uses the local dialing code 02.

The city has a population of 624,579, with another source citing 627,503 residents. Ndola is twinned with Makhachkala, Porto, Walvis Bay, and Lubumbashi. Its official website is cityofndola.gov.zm.

Synthesized by Vinony from 44 facts across 7 sources: Wikidata, Openweathermap, OpenStreetMap, GeoNames, Open Meteo, Vinony graph, Geo. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.

Weather now

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7-day forecast

via Open-Meteo

Place details

Locality: Ndola
Region: Copperbelt Province
Country: Zambia
Population: 627,503
Timezone: Africa/Lusaka

via OpenStreetMap · GeoNames

Air quality

84US AQIModerate

PM2.5: 21.1 µg/m³
PM10: 22.1 µg/m³

As of 2026-08-11 02:00 · Open-Meteo

Key facts

Settlement.official_name: Ndola
Settlement.nickname: NoliNoli
Settlement.settlement_type: City
Settlement.image_skyline: Ndola01.jpg
Settlement.imagesize: 250px
Settlement.image_caption: Downtown Ndola
Settlement.pushpin_map: Zambia#Africa
Settlement.pushpin_label_position: bottom
Settlement.pushpin_map_caption: Location in Zambia
Settlement.subdivision_type: Country
Settlement.subdivision_type1: Province
Settlement.subdivision_name1: Copperbelt Province
Settlement.subdivision_type2: District
Settlement.subdivision_name2: Ndola District
Settlement.leader_title: Mayor
Settlement.leader_name: Samuel Munthali
Settlement.established_title: Inception
Settlement.established_date: 1904

via Wikipedia infobox

Travel guide

Understand

The crackings and creakings of plate tectonics brought a rich vein of minerals, principally copper, to lie beneath northern Zambia, with the Katanga finger of the Democratic Republic of Congo extending south to share in this. This was loot for the colonial powers, exploiting dirt-cheap local labour in hazardous conditions for a valuable material whose profits were enjoyed far away - by Belgium for what is now the DRC, and by Britain for Northern Rhodesia which is now Zambia. Independence meant that a local clique clawed the profits away from multi-national companies, but with small benefit to the country at large or to those who sweated in the mines. And to the extent that those countries did benefit, there was resentment at sharing the profits, so separatist movements sprang up using much the same rhetoric that they'd chanted against the colonists.

In Zambia Kenneth Kaunda kept a lid on things, but the Congo conflict spiralled into civil war, with Katanga declaring independence and armed conflict in the Congo engulfing even UN non-combatant peacekeepers. On 18 Sept 1961 Dag Hammarskjöld, the second Secretary-General of the United Nations, flew in to resolve the conflict. His aircraft crashed on approach to Ndola and all on board were killed. The circumstances of this have been pored over as closely as those around the death of JF Kennedy, with multiple conspiracy theories. The key point is that he was inbound, with everything still to play for in the peace talks; so this f…