2018 Human Development Index (HDI)
The Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite index focusing on three basic dimensions of human development: the ability to lead a long and healthy life, measured by life expectancy at birth; the ability to acquire knowledge, measured by mean years of schooling and expected years of schooling; and the ability to achieve a decent standard of living, measured by gross national income per capita.
To measure human development more comprehensively, the Human Development Report presents four other composite indices. The Inequality-adjusted HDI discounts the HDI according to the extent of inequality. The Gender Development Index compares female and male HDI values. The Gender Inequality Index highlights women’s empowerment. And the Multidimensional Poverty Index measures nonincome dimensions of poverty.
The 2018 Update presents HDI values for 189 countries and territories with the most recent data for 2017. Of these countries, 59 are in the very high human development group, 53 in the high, 39 in the medium and only 38 in the low. In 2010, 49 countries were in the low human development group.
The top five countries in the global HDI ranking are Norway (0.953), Switzerland (0.944), Australia (0.939), Ireland (0.938) and Germany (0.936). The bottom five are Burundi (0.417), Chad (0.404), South Sudan (0.388), the Central African Republic (0.367) and Niger (0.354). The largest increases in HDI rank between 2012 and 2017 were for Ireland, which moved up 13 places, and for Botswana, the Dominican Republic and Turkey, which each moved up 8. The largest declines were for the Syrian Arab Republic (down 27), Libya (26) and Yemen (20).
Top 50 countries in HDI 2018
- Norway
- Switzerland
- Australia
- Ireland
- Germany
- Iceland
- Hong Kong, China (SAR)
- Sweden
- Singapore
- Netherlands
- Denmark
- Canada
- United States
- United Kingdom
- Finland
- New Zealand
- Belgium
- Liechtenstein
- Japan
- Austria
- Luxembourg
- Israel
- Korea (Republic of)
- France
- Slovenia
- Spain
- Czechia
- Italy
- Malta
- Estonia
- Greece
- Cyprus
- Poland
- United Arab Emirates
- Andorra
- Lithuania
- Qatar
- Slovakia
- Brunei Darussalam
- Saudi Arabia
- Latvia
- Portugal
- Bahrain
- Chile
- Hungary
- Croatia
- Argentina
- Oman
- Russian Federation
- Montenegro
