Bayonne ( bay-(Y)OHN) is a city in Hudson County in the U.S. state of New Jersey, in the Gateway Region on Bergen Neck, a peninsula between Newark Bay to the west, the Kill Van Kull to the south, and New York Bay to the east. At the 2020 United States census, it was the state's 15th-most-populous municipality, surpassing Passaic, with a population of 71,686, an increase of 8,662 (+13.7%) from the 2010 census count of 63,024, which in turn reflected an increase of 1,182 (+1.9%) from the 61,842 counted in the 2000 census. The Census Bureau's Population Estimates Program calculated a population of 74,532 for 2024, making it the 517th-most populous municipality in the nation. Bayonne was formed as a township in 1861, from portions of Bergen Township, and reincorporated as a city by an act of the New Jersey Legislature in 1869.