US states by population data (you’ll have to do a little work to sort).
New York City population - estimated 8.4M in 2024.
The only states it’s lower than are:
- Virginia
- New Jersey
- Michigan
- North Carolina
- Georgia
- Ohio
- Illinois
- Pennsylvania
- New York
- Florida
- Texas
- California
Not quite correct. Kazakhstan is in central Asia, not Europe, even by a loose definition. Instead, Belgium (Brussels vs. Antwerp) and - by some definitions of Europe - Turkey (Ankara vs. Istanbul) should be on your list.
Wikipedia has a complete list.
Edit: Germany used to be a case that did this intentionally until 1990. While it was split into West and East Germany, West Germany chose Bonn as its capital as Berlin was surrounded by East Germany. They could have chosen a large city like Hamburg, Munich, Cologne or Frankfurt but went with the much smaller Bonn to symbolize that it was only a temporary solution.
Some of the country extends into it, making it transcontinental, like Turkey. Yeah, I should have included Turkey; good catch.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazakhstan
Oh, TIL that the small part by the Caspian Sea is far enough west to be considered Europe. Thanks for the correction.