Hey,
I was asked if i lived in a metropolitan or urban location. I’m slightly confused because as far as i understand both words have very similar meanings. Urban means pertaining to a city while metropolitan means a large city. Could any one be kind enough to clarify the distinction between the two words.
Regards,
Englishlearner 25.
Hello EnglishLearner25,
You seem to have answered your own question: something [color=blue]urban relates to a [color=blue]city, big or small; something [color=green]metropolitan relates to a [color=green]city, but only a big/major city.
We also have the word [color=purple]cosmopolitan for things related to [color=purple]“variety from all over the world”, which is often a metropolitan characteristic, socially and culturally. ;o)
Cheers from the metropolitan and cosmopolitan city of São Paulo/Brazil,
Planta
“Urban” means the city itself, small or large. “Metropolitan” means the city and its suburbs together, not a large city.
Not quite.
Urban is an adjective that means having the characteristics of a city. So that an urban house would be one that is likely to be found in a city.
Metropolitan comes from the noun metropolis (from the Greek meter ‘mother’ and polis ‘city’), meaning mother city, referring to the primary city or main city within a collection of communities.
Newark, New Jersey is a city, but it is part of the New York City metropolitan area (because NYC is the main (or ‘mother’) city. The same is true of Potsdam and Berlin in Germany. All are cities and could be called urban, but the larger city is the namesake of the metropolitan area.
But my point was that a metropolitan area includes the central city together with the other outlying cities. A metropolitan area is not a “big city”, as those guys were claiming.
OK misunderstood your previous post 
Dear Jamie(K),
I totally agree.
Well, we guys weren’t exactly claiming anything on “metropolitan area”, but on the semantics of the adjectives “metropolitan” and “urban” alone.
“Metropolitan” alone does support the “major-city-only” interpretation. (TheFreeDictionary-metropolitan-1a) (Merriam-Webster-metropolis-3b).
Relating “metropolitan” to the more specific “metropolitan area” case (TFD-metropolitan-1b) may be popular, but not exclusive.
It is nevertheless pertinent to EnglishLearner25’s original question.
So, if one lives in a metropolitan area, but only in a small “satellite” city (not the big, central city), one may…* …feel limited to say “I live in an urban location” (minding their small satellite city’s limitations)
Provincial cheers,
Planta.
Thank you all for your response. As planta rightly points out, my question was referring to metropolitan vs urban. Although i appreciate the explanation for what constitutes as a metropolitan area, i was more interested in the difference between the adjectives metropolitan and urban. There is an obvious distinction between the two and thank you again for helping me understand.
hi Planta! i chanced upon this thread looking for the difference between metropolitan and cosmopolitan. so happens i’m doing a project that involves São Paulo/Brazil and i was wondering which… so could you enlighten me about being BOTH a metro and cosmo??
hope to hear from you soon please 
thanks much!
metropolitan - relating to the natives and native cultures, etc. of a capital or chief city/cities within a specific area/country.
cosmopolitan - a mixture of cultures and immigrants brought together within a city.
hmmm that sure helps a bit thank you! so it’s possible for a city, like Sao Paulo, to be both metropolitan and cosmopolitan?
It certainly is.