The New York metropolitan area is home to the largest and most prominent ethnic Chinese population outside of Asia, with populations representing all 34 provincial-level administrative units of China. Estimated at 924,619 in 2024, it is the largest and most prominent metropolitan Asian national diaspora outside Asia. New York City proper contained an estimated 628,763 Chinese Americans in 2017, by far the highest ethnic Chinese population of any city outside Asia.
New York City and its surrounding metropolitan area, including Long Island and parts of New Jersey, is home to 12 Chinatowns: districts where Chinese immigrants were made to live for economic survival and physical safety that are now known as important sites of tourism and urban economic activity. The city proper includes six Chinatowns (or nine, including the emerging Chinatowns in Elmhurst and Whitestone, Queens, and East Harlem, Manhattan). There are also Chinese communities in more suburban areas such as Jersey City, New Jersey, Nassau County, Long Island; Edison, New Jersey; West Windsor, New Jersey; and Parsippany-Troy Hills, New Jersey.