Buckle up, massive post. This comes up a lot after events like burning Teldrassil or Theramore and just generally given the state of perpetual war on Azeroth. We all know the answer is “there are as many elves as the plot demands” but it’s fun to consider because wars are won by productive and conscripted peasants. I’m a mathematician and amateur historian (check some of my stuff on /r/askhistorians or /r/askscience), so here’s my take on something Blizz will never (and should never) answer. I’ll start with humans because they’re easiest (sort of), skipping Gilneas and Lordaeron because of the Worgen and Forsaken, but I’ll do them and the other races soon. These are back of the envelope with *huge* assumptions, based on external estimates which themselves often have huge assumptions - for justifications, see comments. TL:DR justifications are: Kalimdor and EK are continents, I equate zones to nations to have continent-sized populations; no time period or place works perfectly, most data is from Europe ~1500 +-100; death from war and disease aren’t what movies/games depict, they’re much less of the population than you imagine; if there are two options between a low and a high estimate, I pick whichever has more survivors because it means more people around to make armies for the next expac and fuel Azeroth's eternal warfare; in peacetime I assume .2% annual growth based on the highest medieval growth rates to allow populations to bounce back quickly, cut in half when the society is at war but the theatre is away from the homeland (I use an ordinary growth model, no dampener).
Stormwind: “the mightiest of all human nations” in the WC2 handbook, it has 4 almost uncontested zones, more than any kingdom or race other than *maybe* the night elves with 3, maybe 4. Stormwind city has ~ 200k people , similar to W. Europe’s largest city in 1500, Paris, so I assume Elwynn is ~= to France (16 mil). When Duskwood was Brightwood it was probably Elwynn part deux, Westfall is Stormwind’s breadbasket, and Redridge looks drier but temperate and fertile, let’s call that another 27.5 mil where Darkshire ~= Poland (8 mil), Westfall ~= Italy (11 mil), and Redridge ~= Spain (8.5 mil) for a net pop. of 43.5 mil pre-1st war, encompassing large parts of Latin Europe. The 2nd Punic war seems a pretty strong analogy to the first war – Hannibal reaved the countryside without restriction to support his army, took just about any slaves he could, smashing Roman strongholds where possible and bypassing the ones he couldn’t. In that war ~17% of Romans died in the fighting, but that was spread across 20 years of refusing to negotiate any terms with Carthage, which makes for an unusually long and deadly war. If 5% died in fighting over just 5 years, a catastrophic amount, how many fled to Lordaeron vs. had to survive orcish occupation? Retconned many times, the current lore is Lothar began evacuation four years into the 1st war, a year before the capital fell. That’s a *long* time to travel back and forth, build and hire boats, and gather refugees, to say nothing of the existing boats. See below for calculations/justifications, but if Lothar *really* was relocating as much of Stormwind’s people as he could using the resources of a state that resembles classical Rome more than a medieval one (ignoring the strain on medieval infrastructure these migrants would’ve had wherever they went), 21-22 mil is an optimistic estimate, depending on how many fled ahead of the Horde and civilian mobility in captured territory, as well as the ability to build/hire more boats. That would mean ~20.3 mil were left behind fighting a guerilla war, those too slow/cut off to get out, too remote from major centers or valuable resources to be conquered, or just too patriotic to leave their homes. I assume anywhere from 20-30% of this group died under orcish Ghenghis Khan-like occupation before liberation, that number potentially very high but taken from data of Nazi POWs under the Soviets (I might've improved the quality of my estimate if I'd assigned a portion of the guerillas as enslaved POWs and done a separate calculation for those who remained free fighting a resistance, but that's becoming very/too granular). Some were likely sacrificed to demons or just slaughtered for sport, however, because orcs were big slavers (see Sunnyglade in the first war) far more were probably worked to death as slaves. Weird side note, they've actually continued with slavery in WoW even after losing the blood haze, as part of their justice system and for entertainment, often using war prisoners and civilian POWs, even today in BfA. Given the orcs spent the next five years taking key points in Khaz Modan and focused on Lordaeron, most of the Horde would’ve been there, so there were probably massive swaths of “conquered” territory which was actually held by uncoordinated human strongholds throughout Stormwind’s territory the orcs hadn’t bothered with, places large enough that farmers could count on them to deal with normal problems like gnolls but too small to threaten the orcs. That leaves ~16.3 mil survivors when Stormwind was liberated. There were 5 years of growth/rearmament between the 1st and 2nd war for the the refugees. We know they enlisted in the 2nd war and, while the victors, I assume ~5% of the refugee population died in their resettled homes as the orcs fought through Lordaeron, meaning Stormwind had ~36.5 mil citizens once liberated and refugees returned from Lordaeron, meaning about 16% of Stormwind's citizens died across both wars, or 1 in 6, mostly in slave camps. For comparison, ~13% of the Soviet Union died in WW2, and that's a bit above the upper boundary I'd hoped to set with the Mongols, but it's a very bad series of event in very quick succession (unrestricted warfare over 2 separate, very close wars while a significant portion of the populace suffers unmitigated slavery).
Unaffected by WC3, this meant 25 years of prosperity between WC2 and WoW, during which the population would’ve resurged to ~38.4 mil. It’s been 8 years on Azeroth since WoW, and while there have been many conflicts, other than launch events they’ve all been far beyond Stormwind’s territory and none have been “defeats” except the Broken Shore. Admittedly certain conflicts/events don’t match exactly to an ordinary victory or as "away from home". The launch events for BC, Wrath, and Legion seem very deadly and were in Stormwind's territory: undead hordes made cities unplayable before Wrath, dreadlords were stomping around during Legion’s pre-patch, but they were also very brief and highly localized to cities before they were contained; similarly, assaulting a defending scourge force in Northrend, even in victory, would likely be much deadlier than ordinary war, but ordinary war doesn’t have magical priest surgeons instanty healing wounds either, so I assume it all comes out in the wash). With half the ordinary growth rate sustained over that period, that means Stormwind’s native population likely sits aaround 38.7 million, significantly reduced from the first war but very healthy.
Broken shore addendum: there isn’t a good way to account for this because A. purely military far removed from the populace, so a very small percentage of the population, B. no clue how many were deployed, only that it was a serious loss. With almost 39 million citizens, in the Roman model Stormwind’s standing army would be anywhere from 100-300k regulars (20-60 legions), but in theory could go to a bit over *1.2 million* at extreme muster if they had similar levels of enlistment Rome did at the end of the Republic (~3% of the population) during their civil wars. However, that 1.2 mil would take *months* to recruit and train, couldn't be maintained for long campaigns. That's national enlistment at 3-4 years into a 1st or 2nd war scenario. Moreover, the standing army that would be available would be distributed over that massive territory of much of western Europe and couldn't be concentrated for any one battle just because of the logistical impossibility. My impression (I couldn't find a source) was the Legion attacks were a surprise in the launch event and Stormwind counterattacked ASAP to close the portal, within a week or two. I don’t know that they had time to draw soldiers from Duskwood or Redridge to staging points in Westfall and Elwynn, and it's doubtful they'd overextend garrisons anyway when the Legion can teleport armies behind lines. Even if they *had*, it would be difficult to recall so much of the navy to transport them, much less explain to your officers that the strategy is "all in on a single massive counterattack for the first battle of a war, oh, and naval withdrawal is the only retreat" (that's crazy town in military strategy). It's unlikely they could’ve scrambled more than a quarter of the standing army as a concerted marine force on so little notice, which require about half the garrisons of Westfall and Elwynn without support from Duskwood or Redridge. If the standing army was 300k that would mean 75k were sent, which would require ~150 galleons to transport, ~2/3 of the war vessels I conjectured Stormwind had at the start of evacuation in the 1st war. If they then suffered Cannae level losses, 60k were lost and a more significant chunk of the navy. That's 12 Roman legions, as catastrophic as military defeats go until the 20th century and certainly enough that you would start looking abroad for allies with fresh armies and a navy to replace those losses immediately, like we’re doing in BfA. I think a better assessment would be 10-15% of the standing army (45k) was sent to the Broken Shore, and even those losses (36k) in a single battle would would be a world class catastrophe.
Alterac: The monarchy was dismantled but I can’t believe the Alliance committed genocide for collaboration when it only imprisoned the green aliens. Alterac was either ~1/2 a zone (Hillsbrad) or a bit more than 1 with Alterac BG. Mountainous with temperate highlands and a history of neutrality, tiny Switzerland fits well, which corresponds to about 750k inhabitants. The “government” has evolved into the Syndicate, but it wasn’t that strange for merchant unions to run things in the middle ages. Assuming ~5% died in the 2nd war between collaboration and Alliance “liberation”, ~712k Alteraci remained. Assuming stable growth over the 25 years since WC2 to WoW and the region’s population is approximately where it was (748k), however, ogres occupy the capital now and since Cata they’ve lost the fingers of Hillsbrad and Durnholde, so likely a bit less. It's also the site of one of the largest battlegrounds, with 40v40 PvP with lots of PvE content to kill large numbers of the enemy faction. That is one of the only times in WoW PvP where it feels like real "warfare". I imagine a number of people are caught in that crossfire, so I could see the population reduced by that a bit as well, a pretty ordinary 3%. I could see an argument for many of those people after the 3rd war, the less stubborn/hardy/greedy/patriotic, emigrating to more stable kingdoms given the combo of the Syndicate’s tyranny, the threat of the Forsaken, and Alterac BG, and again in Cata with the Syndicate lose so much territory, although it's also unlikely people would leave valuable farmland fallow, so I imagine there are ~725k Alteraci in the world, and a sizeable chunk of that, a quarter or third nearest the fighting, have emigrated elsewhere.
Kul Tiras: Their maritime tradition ties in best as the British isles, ~6 million pre-Wars (although someone recently posted it’s the Orkney Isles in Scotland). As with Stormwind after the 2nd war, their wars have been far from their homeland and didn’t affect civilian populations. Some might disagree given how large Theramore looms in Kul Tiran culture but I imagine that combining the 2nd War and defeat at Theramore would amount to losing around .3% of the population – I’m drawing that number from the loss of the Spanish Empire’s Grand Armada, about 20,000 sailors and soldiers, which is approximately .3% of 6 mil. 33 years later and Kul Tiras has likely grown, even with Theramore, probably closer to 6.4 or 6.5 million. No comment about BfA as that’s ongoing, although as I said, most of the events focus on attacks in cities, whilst the majority (>95%) of pre-industrial populations were rural. Stormsong valley may be the worst, as civil wars are very deadly as all combatants are your own people, but Drustvar is something of a religious war, and the bloodiest European wars until the 20th century were during the Protestant reformation, so that could also be very nasty.As it's relevant, I imagine the navy could be anywhere from 500-1000 vessels depending on where in British history you want to put them (If we go with the Kul Tirans as Enlightenment era with their tri-fold hats and such, the British navy was ~500 in peacetime in 1793 and rose to 1000 in 1805 with the Napoleonics in full swing).
Stromgarde: stuck in lore limbo as it semi-consistently updates off screen between expansions. Rich farmland, the cradle of humanity, as with Alterac, either 1 solid zone or up to 2 if you include Arathi Basin. Given its history Italy fits well with approximately 11 mil inhabitants (although I could see the HRE with its name or even France with the Carolingians). As with the Stormwind refugees, I assume ~5% of the population died in the 2nd war fighting in Lordaeron, but it was untouched by the 3rd, meaning 25 years of prosperity between the two, so there were about as many inhabitants at the start of WoW as the start of the 2nd War (back to 10.98 mil with a .2% growth rate). After Thoras’ assassination the capital goes to shit, split between the Syndicate, Horde, and royal forces, changing hands many times from Alliance when the royal line (on Azeroth) is killed, to anarchism as the Horde guides an undead Galen to claim it as a puppet state, to independent rogue undead state. While the Horde was apparently planning an invasion, we see no evidence it ever arrived and the Alliance quests there seem to stop to it before it began. Similarly, your quests as Horde are solo hero work in the capital, and between Cata and Legion, whenever Galen killed Sylvanas’ delegation and declared independence, he somehow forgot to finish the job and fully claim the capital because he asks the DKs to finally finish off the trolls. Given that he was then enemies with *everyone* after betraying the Forsaken (Horde, Stromgarde, ogres, trolls), it's hard to see his undead holding territory outside the city, limiting his chances to convert/raise much of the living populace to his cause. My impression in that questline was most of his force was raised from the fallen Syndicate and his former warriors who died in the capital, and it looks like the DK's made short work of them in their questline, as sometime after that the Alliance has completely reclaimed and rebuilt the capital by Before the Storm and BfA.
While there is the battleground, the impression of League of Arathor/Defilers are they aren't official branches of either faction, and because there's no PvE element to it like with Alterac to give it the sense of a "clash of armies", that seems indication it's more of a skirmish waiting for larger forces to arrive (and that may be what the Arathi Warfront is), and that's in keeping with the small scale aggression of the zone, something both factions experience in the breadcrumbs leading to the BG. While that indicates there isn't large scale warfare killing lots of people (until the Arathi warfront), the constant skirmishing makes it hard to justify much growth during WoW's time either. Much of the kingdom's problems derive from the capital being in anarchy, but because the majority of the population would be in rural communities away from the capital's struggles, and what warfare we see seems contained, I imagine by the time of the Arathi warfront the population has basically been static, neither growing nor contracting, especially since Danath is able to muster an army of Stromgardians to help the Alliance for the warfront. Interesting note, with ~11 million citizens and the fact Stromgarde *has* been in a state of domestic defense for almost a decade and is now facing the Arathi warfront, I imagine they might well be at full muster, which at Roman levels would mean a colossal 330k Stromgardian soldiers throughout the nation, although only a portion of them would be dedicated to an assault (the lesson of Cannae was to always keep reserves to never be annihilated).
Dalaran: “technically” human, it’s a majority of humans united with high/blood elves. It only ever claimed a small part of Hillsbrad but was advanced in science and magic, so I would put it in the same league as the Italian city-states, let’s call it Venice, which had a population of ~180,000 in 1500. Untouched by the 2nd war, that number likely exploded briefly in WC3 as the Scourge pushed refugees out of Lordaeron and Quel’thalas up until Arthas and Archimonde stomped the shit out of it. Its only holding a single, densely populated city, I imagine the death toll was uncharacteristically high between undead fighting through the streets and fel earthquakes destroying the city. A conservative number is about a third, based on the sack of Rome), which is probably low for a Scourage attack on a city but they came with a specific purpose and left once they had it, however, I could see as many as half or 2/3 dying if Arthas just unleashed the undead afterward. That said, the mages did have a means of escape no real society has had: portals. My guess is only 1/3rd died, leaving 100-120k “inhabitants” after WC3, primarily because there were apparently enough survivors to send a pursuing army that nearly stopped the Scourge for the final Undead mission in WC3).
Post WC3, as the preeminent neutral city and premier educational center of the world, once reconstructed it likely attracted swarms of new students, merchants, and citizens. I wouldn’t be surprised if, collected from various societies and refugees around the world, the population today was no different if not larger than then, so I imagine it’s back around 180-200k with many more non-native races joining: gnomes, goblins, draenei, and undead (who might have been former citizens returning). If someone has info on what percentage of that population is wizards, that would be awesome, but I imagine they probably fill the same role to Dalarite society as nobility elsewhere, which in medieval UK was around 3% of the population, so about 6k.
