6.4500° N, 3.4000° E
LAGOS
Most Famous People Born in Lagos, Nigeria
- Notable people
- 795
- Peak decade
- 1980s
- Median birth year
- 1983
- Most distinctive
- Songwriter 7.5×
A football factory in a city of twenty million. More than two in five of Lagos's notable births play professional football — the highest share of any single profession in any city in the dataset — and most of the rest are basketball players, boxers, activists, and the songwriters of Afrobeats. Almost everyone is born after 1960, and almost everyone leaves at some point to play somewhere else.
One face per decade — the most globally famous figure born in Lagos during each.
Notable Births by Decade
Click a decade to filter the list below. Peak: 1980s with 252 notable births.
What Lagos Is Known For
Click any row to filter the list of people below.
Football is Lagos's biggest profession — 43% of all notables (343).
Lagos over-indexes on songwriter — 7.5× the global rate.
Lagos under-produces politician — only 0.3× the global rate.
Profession Mix Over Time
Each band shows a profession family's share of Lagos's notable births by decade. Hover the chart for the breakdown at any decade.
- Sports
- Politics & Law
- Film & TV
- Music
- Art & Design
- Writing
- Other
- Filtered to 1920s Clear ×
Noel DaCosta
1929 - 2002
Ola Vincent
1925 - 2012
Karim Olowu
1924 - 2019
Wahab Iyanda Folawiyo
1928 - 2008
Frederick Rotimi Williams
1920 - 2005
Olabisi Onabanjo
1927 - 1990
Latunde Odeku
1927 - 1974
Hilda Adefarasin
Born 1925
Talabi Braithwaite
1928 - 2011