The Philadelphia metropolitan area, also referred to as the Delaware Valley or Greater Philadelphia, is a major metropolitan area in the Northeastern United States that centers on Philadelphia, the sixth-most populous city in the United States. This area spans up to four states: southeastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey, northern Delaware, and the northern Eastern Shore of Maryland, though it is sometimes considered a tri-state region if northeastern Maryland is excluded. With a core metropolitan statistical area population of 6.245 million residents and a combined statistical area population of 7.379 million as of the 2020 census, it is the ninth-largest metropolitan area in the United States in 2024 and the 68th-largest metropolitan region in the world.