DavidMSC responds to the news that San Antonio has overtaken Dallas in population:

You see, San Antonio city limits DO contain 1,214,725 residents. Dallas city limits contain 1,208,318 residents. Therefore, S.A. has more people. But wait: if you gauge population according to Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA), then the Dallas metroplex contains 5.6 million people, whereas S.A. only has 1.7 million people. The reason is that the "metro" area surrounding Dallas includes Fort Worth and many large suburbs, but San Antonio has no such adjacent/bordering suburbs and communities.

And really, when most people think of "big cities," they are thinking of Chicago, D/FW, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and others of similar size, shape, composition, etc.

So where does San Antonio rank in terms of MSA? Number 29. Behind Sacramento, Cleveland, and other technically "smaller" cities.

Dallas has more than suburbs, though, it also has Fort Worth. For anyone outside of Texas, never accuse someone in Fort Worth of being in Dallas (or even worse, a suburb). That still puts it ahead of San Antonio no matter how you calculate it, but I like to make the distinction because (a) I have roots in Fort Worth, (b) that leaves Houston as bigger than Dallas (albeit smaller than DFW), and (c) I'm petty.