Former Khyber Agency · Torkham and the pass · 1,146,267 people in 2023 · headquarters Landi Kotal / Jamrud belt
Khyber District is one of the 38 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, with its headquarters at Landi Kotal / Jamrud. It has 4 tehsils: Bara, Jamrud, Landi Kotal and Mulla Gori. The 2023 census counted 1,146,267 people on 2,576 km², and 38.45% of residents aged 10 and over were literate.
| Name | Type | Population | Area (km²) | Urban | Literacy (10+) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bara | Tehsil | 548,084 | 1,430 | – | 34.72% |
| Jamrud | Tehsil | 243,290 | 311 | 23.28% | 46.18% |
| Landi Kotal | Tehsil | 312,313 | 679 | 12.19% | 38.92% |
| Mulla Gori | Tehsil | 42,580 | 156 | – | 38.36% |
Khyber is the district that holds the pass the rest of the world already named. Until 2018 it was an agency of FATA. After the 25th Amendment it is a settled district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, same legal box as Mardan or Haripur. Building that in schools and a DHQ is the live work. The mountains did not become a city because the law changed.
Afridi clans are the main tribal names on the ground: Kuki Khel, Qambar Khel, Zakha Khel, Malikdin Khel, Aka Khel, Sepah, Adam Khel and the others listed in local administration notes. Pashto is 99 percent-plus of the mother-tongue row. That is not a slogan. It is the census.
Households 166,805. Population 1,146,267. Urban about 94,700. Rural about 1.05 million. Sex ratio about 109 men per 100 women. Under-tens about 395,000 — more than a third of the surveyed people. Literacy 38.45 percent overall, 58.08 percent for men, 17.16 percent for women. That last figure is why a Khyber page that only describes Torkham trucks is unfinished.
Named towns in city lists: Jamrud municipal figures around 56,600 in 2023 compilations; Landi Kotal around 38,000. Bara is the heavy tehsil, not a municipal giant in those same city rows.
Later lists add names such as Bagh Maidan, Bazar Zakha Khel, Fort Salop and Painda Cheena. Those lines are still thin in the 2023 PBS extract used here. They are named here as emerging tehsil titles, without populations.
Torkham is the crossing. Jamrud is the Peshawar-facing gate. Landi Kotal sits on the climb. Freight and passenger traffic are the cash the district sees; they are also why a closed border week hits shops immediately.
Degree colleges have been added since the merger. Many students still sit exams that point to Peshawar. DHQ-level care is the demand people make of the new district. Female literacy at 17 percent means a functioning girls’ high school in Bara and Mula Gori is the test, not a museum of the pass.
Site: khyber.kp.gov.pk. Sources: PBS 2023; KP tehsil literacy rows; district land-use draft figures for the four-tehsil split. September 2026.
The 7th Population and Housing Census (2023) by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) counted 1,146,267 people in Khyber District — 598,268 males and 547,989 females (sex ratio 109.18 males per 100 females). The 2017 census had counted 984,246, so the district gained 162,021 people in six years (difference calculated from the two PBS totals), an average annual growth rate of 2.58%. The district covers 2,576 km², giving a density of 444.98 people per km²; 8.26% of residents live in urban areas and the average household has 6.8 members.
| Tehsil / area | 2017 | 2023 | Annual growth % | Area km² | Density /km² | Sex ratio | Household size |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bara Tehsil | 443,449 | 548,084 | 3.60 | 1,430 | 383.28 | 107.67 | 7.1 |
| Jamrud Tehsil | 227,557 | 243,290 | 1.12 | 311 | 782.28 | 111.69 | 6.5 |
| Landi Kotal Tehsil | 273,052 | 312,313 | 2.27 | 679 | 459.96 | 109.40 | 6.5 |
| Mulla Gori Tehsil | 40,188 | 42,580 | 0.97 | 156 | 272.95 | 112.94 | 7.1 |
PBS reports a literacy rate (age 10+) of 38.45% for Khyber District: 58.08% for males and 17.16% for females, 60.44% in urban areas against 36.37% in rural areas. Of 750,674 residents aged 10 and over, 288,669 were literate. The census also counted 213,510 children aged 5–16 who were out of school (80,749 boys and 132,756 girls).
| Tehsil / area | Literacy % | Male % | Female % | Urban % | Rural % | Out-of-school (5–16) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bara Tehsil | 34.72 | 53.13 | 15.17 | — | 34.72 | 111,845 |
| Jamrud Tehsil | 46.18 | 62.83 | 27.57 | 63.94 | 40.61 | 36,663 |
| Landi Kotal Tehsil | 38.92 | 62.99 | 12.66 | 55.22 | 36.47 | 56,912 |
| Mulla Gori Tehsil | 38.36 | 58.11 | 15.47 | — | 38.36 | 8,090 |
PBS Table 2 lists 2 urban localities in the district (MC = municipal committee, TC = town committee):
Source: Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, Census 2023 — Table 1, Table 2, Table 12. Figures checked against the PBS tables on 2026-10-07.
Khyber District has 4 tehsils: Bara, Jamrud, Landi Kotal and Mulla Gori.
The 2023 census counted 1,146,267 people in Khyber District, up from 984,246 in 2017 (annual growth 2.58%). 8.26% of the population lived in urban areas.
Khyber District covers 2,576 km² according to the 2023 census, a density of 444.98 people per km².
The 2023 census lists 2 urban localities in Khyber District: Jamrud (56,642, town committee) and Landi Kotal (38,065, town committee).
38.45% of people aged 10 and over were literate in the 2023 census (male 58.08%, female 17.16%).
The most common mother tongue in the 2023 census was Pashto (99.7% of the 1,145,982 people in the mother-tongue table).
Khyber District is in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Its headquarters is Landi Kotal / Jamrud.
Khyber was a FATA agency until the 25th Constitutional Amendment, signed on 31 May 2018, merged FATA into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It is now a district of Peshawar Division. (Dawn)