Turkey is divided into 81 provinces (Turkish: il). Each province is divided into a number of districts (ilçe). Each provincial government is seated in the central district (merkez ilçe). For non-metropolitan municipality designated provinces, the central district bears the name of the province (e.g. the city/district of Rize is the central district of Rize Province). In the Ottoman Empire, the corresponding unit was the vilayet. The names of the central districts of all non-metropolitan provinces have the same name as the province.

Each province is administered by an appointed governor (vali) from the Ministry of the Interior.

After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the official establishment of the Republic of Türkiye on 29 October 1923, changes were made to the administrative system. Two years later, Ardahan, Beyoğlu, Çatalca, Dersim, Ergani, Gelibolu, Genç, Kozan, Oltu, Muş, Siverek and Üsküdar provinces were transformed into districts. In 1927, Doğubayazıt was transformed into a district and was made a part of Ağrı. In 1929, Muş became a province again and Bitlis became a district. Four years later, Aksaray, Cebelibereket, Hakkâri and Şebinkarahisar became districts, Mersin and Silifke were merged to form a new province called İçel, and Artvin and Rize were merged to form a new province called Çoruh, bringing the number down to fifty-six. In 1936, Rize, Dersim and Hakkâri became provinces again, in the same year Dersim was renamed Tunceli; 3 years later in 1939, Hatay was annexed to Turkey and became a province. In 1953, it was decided that Uşak would become a province and that Kırşehir would be transformed into a district, one year later in 1954 Adıyaman, Nevşehir and Sakarya gained province status. In 1956, the name of Çoruh province was changed to Artvin, and in 1957 Kırşehir's province status was restored. After this year, there were no changes in the number of provinces for the next 32 years until Aksaray, Bayburt, Karaman and Kırıkkale became provinces in 1989 along with Batman and Şırnak in 1990; Bartın in 1991; Ardahan and Iğdır in 1992; Yalova, Karabük and Kilis in 1995; Osmaniye in 1996, and Düzce in 1999.

Provinces of Turkey Türkiye'nin İlleri (Turkish)
Ankara Kırklareli Edirne Tekirdağ Çanakkale Balıkesir Bursa Yalova Istanbul Kocaeli Sakarya Düzce Zonguldak Bolu Bilecik Eskişehir Kütahya Manisa İzmir Aydın Muğla Denizli Burdur Uşak Afyonkarahisar Isparta Antalya Konya Mersin Karaman Aksaray Kırşehir Kırıkkale Çankırı Karabük Bartın Kastamonu Sinop Çorum Yozgat Nevşehir Niğde Adana Hatay Osmaniye K. Maraş Kayseri Sivas Tokat Amasya Samsun Ordu Giresun Erzincan Malatya Gaziantep Kilis Şanlıurfa Adıyaman Gümüşhane Trabzon Rize Bayburt Erzurum Artvin Ardahan Kars Ağrı Iğdır Tunceli Elazığ Diyarbakır Mardin Batman Siirt Şırnak Bitlis Bingöl Muş Van Hakkâri
Category	Unitary state
Location	Republic of Türkiye
Number	81 Provinces
Populations	83,645 (Tunceli) – 15,840,900 (Istanbul) as at 31 December 2021
Areas	850 km2 (327 sq mi) (Yalova) – 38,260 km2 (14,771 sq mi) (Konya)
Government	Provincial government, National government
Subdivisions	İlçe

List of provinces

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Below is a list of the 81 provinces of Turkey, sorted according to their license plate codes. Initially, the order of the codes matched the alphabetical order of the province names. After Zonguldak (code 67), the ordering is not alphabetical, but in the order of the creation of provinces, as these provinces were created more recently and thus their plate numbers were assigned after the initial set of codes had been assigned.

Codes

The province's ISO code suffix number, the first two digits of the vehicle registration plates of Turkey, and the first digits of the postal codes in Turkey are the same. The Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS) codes are different.

Defunct provinces

A 1927 map of the provinces of Turkey which was published before the alphabet reform

• Çatalca, now part of Istanbul Province
• Gelibolu, now part of Çanakkale Province
• İçel (Silifke), now part of Mersin Province
• Kozan, now part of Adana Province
• Şebinkarahisar, now part of Giresun Province
• Elazığ Madeni, now part of Elazığ Province
• Genç, now part of Bingöl Province
• Doğubeyazıt, now part of Ağrı Province
• Siverek, now part of Şanlıurfa Province

See also

• Regions of Turkey
• Districts of Turkey
• Villages of Turkey
• Metropolitan centers in Turkey

References