It rose steadily in each of the ten-year statistical periods until 1981 (reaching 838,794 inhabitants) whereafter there were declines until 2001 when the population dipped to 809,586.

In 2012, there were 72,284 foreigners residents in the province (up from 44,996 in 2006), mainly from Romania, Moldova and Albania, representing 8.5% of the total population.

The most popular fields of study were economics, foreign languages, letters and philosophy, and architecture.

In 2005, the main comuni by population were: Tourism was an important contributor to the provincial economy with over 26,000 establishments (including 1,277 hotels) offering overnight accommodation and accounting for a total of 34 million tourist nights spent in 2012 (down slightly from 2011 but substantially higher than some 29 million nights in 2002).

In 2012, the service sector represented 73% of the economy, while industry covered 19%, construction 7% and agriculture just 1%.