Number of students at Hogwarts

I was perusing Mugglenet yesterday, and it says that:

"Hogwarts has about a thousand students. (True, that number doesn't seem right, but J.K.R. said so, and she's the boss.)"

I don't know if that's reliable, but I thought I'd share.

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Originally Posted by Maple_and_PheonixFeather

"Hogwarts has about a thousand students. (True, that number doesn't seem right, but J.K.R. said so, and she's the boss.)"

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I think I mentioned in an earlier post that there was an interview on the number, but I couldn't remember where it was, so thanks for finding it! I'd say it's pretty reliable to stay on that number, and follow canon as much as possible otherwise (even though the class size doesn't always reflect this). Quidditch games are really the only things that reflect this number in the books. Who knows? Anything's possible with this school :P

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Originally Posted by Jeannie

Is it possible that maybe there was once way more magical people in Great Britain? Like, because of a number of factors, the population is just all together slowing down? I'm thinking pure-blood inbreeding, personally. ;)

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There are definitely fewer wizards than before, how many there were before... I've no idea.

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Originally Posted by Maple_and_PheonixFeather

I was perusing Mugglenet yesterday, and it says that:

"Hogwarts has about a thousand students. (True, that number doesn't seem right, but J.K.R. said so, and she's the boss.)"

I don't know if that's reliable, but I thought I'd share.

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I remember reading that as well... But I also remember her saying in another interview that there about 3000 wizards/witches in Britain - I think it popped up as one of the Trivia items on mugglenet. Is it just me who thinks thats a very disproportionate number of children to adults...?

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Originally Posted by Alex

I remember reading that as well... But I also remember her saying in another interview that there about 3000 wizards/witches in Britain - I think it popped up as one of the Trivia items on mugglenet. Is it just me who thinks thats a very disproportionate number of children to adults...?

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Well, that would support a smaller number of students at Hogwarts. That is, 3000 total would help support the hints from the books that suggest a much smaller number of magical children.

Yes the population of 3000 more closely matches their only being 40 students in harry's year. 11-18 year olds make up ~11% of the population in britan which means 330 total students at hogwarts if we're going to be using round numbers, and considering the obscenely long life spans of magicals probably not even that many.

as to those who were speculating on the number of students in the years below harry and co. if there was a post war baby boom then there would have been a lot of august/september births the following year which while increasing the number of incoming students in his second year would have resulted in a huge number of firsties in his third.

another point mentioned above is the sorting, even if the hat only takes a few seconds for each student, the book gives no indication that they lined up in alphabetical order so it would take time for them to make their way out of the line and up to the hat. then their is the fact that some sortings take a while seamus' was specifically mentioned to have taken about a minute and neville's took a while and he ran off still wearing the hat. so if in PoA they went up to the first floor and down a little ways to her office harry wiated a few minutes and then it was back down to the great hall, so less than 20 minutes for what would have to be a massive, for hogwarts, baby boom class. this means that if we assume the average sorting to take ~20 minutes then a class of 40 students would average half a minute to make their way from the line, get sorted, and account for any neville-esque hijinks.