The Metropolitan Area of Barcelona , often referred to as Greater Barcelona, is a territorial entity operating on the principle of metropolitan municipality composed of Barcelona and 35 adjacent municipalities around the city. This territorial entity integrated by three territorial executive bodies and has a population of 3,239,337 (Idescat, 2014) within an area of 636 km². It is the main core of the Àmbit metropolità de Barcelona, which has a population of 5,012,961 and Barcelona metropolitan area, with a population of 5 million.