From the mid-19th century until today, life expectancy at birth in the United States has roughly doubled, from 39.4 years in 1850 to 79.6 years in 2025. It is estimated that life expectancy in the U.S. began its upward trajectory in the 1880s, largely driven by the decline in infant and child mortality through factors such as vaccination programs, antibiotics, and other healthcare advancements. Improved food security and access to clean water, as well as general increases in living standards (such as better housing, education, and increased safety) also contributed to a rise in life expectancy across all age brackets. There were notable dips in life expectancy; with an eight year drop during the American Civil War in the 1860s, a seven year drop during the Spanish Flu empidemic in 1918, and a 2.5 year drop during the Covid-19 pandemic. There were also notable plateaus (and minor decreases) not due to major historical events, such as that of the 2010s, which has been attributed to a combination of factors such as unhealthy lifestyles, poor access to healthcare, poverty, and increased suicide rates, among others. However, despite the rate of progress slowing since the 1950s, most decades do see a general increase in the long term, and current UN projections predict that life expectancy at birth in the U.S. will increase by another nine years before the end of the century.

Life expectancy in the United Kingdom was below 39 years in the year 1765, and over the course of the next two and a half centuries, it is expected to have increased by more than double, to 81.1 by the year 2020. Although life expectancy has generally increased throughout the UK's history, there were several times where the rate deviated from its previous trajectory. These changes were the result of smallpox epidemics in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, new sanitary and medical advancements throughout time (such as compulsory vaccination), and the First world War and Spanish Flu epidemic in the 1910s.

PLEASE if you use or like this dataset UPVOTE 👁️

This dataset offers a detailed historical record of global life expectancy, covering data from 1960 to the present. It is meticulously curated to enable deep analysis of trends and gender disparities in life expectancy worldwide.

Dataset Structure & Key Columns:

Country Code (🔤): Unique identifier for each country.

Country Name (🌍): Official name of the country.

Region (🌐): Broad geographical area (e.g., Asia, Europe, Africa).

Sub-Region (🗺️): More specific regional classification within the broader region.

Intermediate Region (🔍): Additional granular geographical grouping when applicable.

Year (📅): The specific year to which the data pertains.

Life Expectancy for Women (👩‍⚕️): Average years a woman is expected to live in that country and year.

Life Expectancy for Men (👨‍⚕️): Average years a man is expected to live in that country and year.

Context & Use Cases:

This dataset is a rich resource for exploring long-term trends in global health and demography. By comparing life expectancy data over decades, researchers can:

Analyze Time Series Trends: Forecast future changes in life expectancy and evaluate the impact of health interventions over time.

Study Gender Disparities: Investigate the differences between life expectancy for women and men, providing insights into social, economic, and healthcare factors influencing these trends.

Regional & Sub-Regional Analysis: Compare and contrast life expectancy across various regions and sub-regions to understand geographical disparities and their underlying causes.

Support Public Policy Research: Inform policymakers by linking life expectancy trends with public health policies, socioeconomic developments, and other key indicators.

Educational & Data Science Applications: Serve as a comprehensive teaching tool for courses on public health, global development, and data analysis, as well as for Kaggle competitions and projects.

With its detailed, structured format and broad temporal coverage, this dataset is ideal for anyone looking to gain a nuanced understanding of global health trends and to drive impactful analyses in public health, social sciences, and beyond.

Feel free to ask for further customizations or additional details as needed!

As of 2023, the countries with the highest life expectancy included Switzerland, Japan, and Spain. As of that time, a new-born child in Switzerland could expect to live an average of **** years. Around the world, females consistently have a higher average life expectancy than males, with females in Europe expected to live an average of *** years longer than males on this continent. Increases in life expectancy The overall average life expectancy in OECD countries increased by **** years from 1970 to 2019. The countries that saw the largest increases included Turkey, India, and South Korea. The life expectancy at birth in Turkey increased an astonishing 24.4 years over this period. The countries with the lowest life expectancy worldwide as of 2022 were Chad, Lesotho, and Nigeria, where a newborn could be expected to live an average of ** years. Life expectancy in the U.S. The life expectancy in the United States was ***** years as of 2023. Shockingly, the life expectancy in the United States has decreased in recent years, while it continues to increase in other similarly developed countries. The COVID-19 pandemic and increasing rates of suicide and drug overdose deaths from the opioid epidemic have been cited as reasons for this decrease.

The differences between males and females in life expectancy at birth are decomposed by selected causes of death. Changes in mortality rates for a given cause of death change over time and contribute to the overall change in life expectancy.

The life expectancy for men aged 65 years in the U.S. has gradually increased since the 1960s. Now men in the United States aged 65 can expect to live 18.2 more years on average. Women aged 65 years can expect to live around 20.7 more years on average. Life expectancy in the U.S. As of 2023, the average life expectancy at birth in the United States was 78.39 years. Life expectancy in the U.S. had steadily increased for many years but has recently dropped slightly. Women consistently have a higher life expectancy than men but have also seen a slight decrease. As of 2023, a woman in the U.S. could be expected to live up to 81.1 years. Leading causes of death The leading causes of death in the United States include heart disease, cancer, unintentional injuries, and cerebrovascular diseases. However, heart disease and cancer account for around 42 percent of all deaths. Although heart disease and cancer are the leading causes of death for both men and women, there are slight variations in the leading causes of death. For example, unintentional injury and suicide account for a larger portion of deaths among men than they do among women.

Life expectancy at birth is decomposed by age specific death rates, which can change over time and contribute to the overall change in life expectancy.

In India, life expectancy at the time of birth increased by 22 years between 1970 and 2019. This statistic shows the increase of the average life expectancy at birth in selected countries between 1970 and 2019.

Life expectancy at birth is decomposed by selected causes of death, including certain types of cancers, infectious diseases, circulatory diseases, respiratory diseases, and external causes. External causes include drug poisoning deaths, falls and transportation accidents. Changes in mortality rates for a given cause of death change over time and contribute to the overall change in life expectancy.

Across the world, people are living longer. In 1900, the average life expectancy of a newborn was 32 years. By 2021 this had more than doubled to 71 years. But where, when, how, and why has this dramatic change occurred? To understand it, we can look at data on life expectancy worldwide. The large reduction in child mortality has played an important role in increasing life expectancy. But life expectancy has increased at all ages. Infants, children, adults, and the elderly are all less likely to die than in the past, and death is being delayed. This remarkable shift results from advances in medicine, public health, and living standards. Along with it, many predictions of the ‘limit’ of life expectancy have been broken.

Data Dictionary

life_expectancy.csv

life_expectancy_different_ages.csv

life_expectancy_female_male.csv

citation(tidytuesday)

The release contains reference tables of Healthy Life Expectancy (HLE).

Release contains reference tables of Disability-Free Life Expectancy (DFLE)

This dataset provides estimates for life expectancy at birth at the county level for each state, the District of Columbia, and the United States as a whole for 1980-2014, as well as the changes in life expectancy and mortality risk for each location during this period.

Across the world, people are living longer.

In 1900, the average life expectancy of a newborn was 32 years. By 2021 this had more than doubled to 71 years.

But where, when, how, and why has this dramatic change occurred?

To understand it, we can look at data on life expectancy worldwide.

The large reduction in child mortality has played an important role in increasing life expectancy. But life expectancy has increased at all ages. Infants, children, adults, and the elderly are all less likely to die than in the past, and death is being delayed.

This remarkable shift results from advances in medicine, public health, and living standards. Along with it, many predictions of the ‘limit’ of life expectancy have been broken.

, you will find global data and research on life expectancy and related measures of longevity: the probability of death at a given age, the sex gap in life expectancy, lifespan inequality within countries, and more. Life expectancy has increased across the world In 2021, the global average life expectancy was just over 70 years. This is an astonishing fact – because just two hundred years ago, it was less than half.

This was the case for all world regions: in 1800, no region had a life expectancy higher than 40 years.

The average life expectancy has risen steadily and significantly across all regions.1

This extraordinary rise is the result of a wide range of advances in health – in nutrition, clean water, sanitation, neonatal healthcare, antibiotics, vaccines, and other technologies and public health efforts – and improvements in living standards, economic growth, and poverty reduction.

legacy-wordpress-upload Twice as long – life expectancy around the world Life expectancy has doubled over the last two centuries around the world. How has this happened?

📌### ******What you should know about this data****** Period life expectancy is a metric that summarizes death rates across all age groups in one particular year. For a given year, it represents the average lifespan for a hypothetical group of people, if they experienced the same age-specific death rates throughout their whole lives as the age-specific death rates seen in that particular year. This data is compiled from three sources: the United Nations’ World Population Prospects (UN WPP), Zijdeman et al. (2015)2, and Riley (2005)3. For data points before 1950, we use Human Mortality Database data4 combined with Zijdeman (2015). From 1950 onwards, we use UN WPP data. For pre-1950 data on world regions and the world as a whole, we use estimates from Riley (2005). Riley (2005)3 compiles life expectancy estimates from hundreds of historical sources and calculates the average of estimates that met an acceptable quality threshold, such as having estimates for entire nations or regions. Less historical data is available from the pre-health transition period in countries – this is especially the case for Africa, Asia, Oceania, and the former Soviet Union. Zijdeman et al. (2015)2 compiles data from various sources: the OECD.Stat database library, the United Nations World Population Prospects Database (UN WPP), the Human Mortality Database (HMD), the Montevideo-Oxford Latin American Economic History Database (MOxLAD), and Gapminder. In some cases, regional databases are used, such as Wrigley et al. (1997)5 for life expectancy in England in the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries; the ONS for Australia; Kannisto et al. (1999)6 for Finland; and data from the Estonian Interuniversity Population Research Centre for Estonia. The UN WPP estimates life expectancy in various countries using data on mortality rates. In poorer countries, where death registration data is often lacking, the underlying data often comes from national household surveys, which are then used to estimate mortality rates and life expectancy.

📌## There are wide differences in life expectancy around the world In 2021, Nigeria's life expectancy was thirty years lower than Japan’s.

This striking fact reflects the wide differences in life expectancy between countries, which you can see on the map.

These wide differences are also reflected within countries. Countries with a lower average life expectancy also tend to have wider variations in lifespans.

📌**## Life expectancy has increased at all ages** It’s a common misconception that life expectancy has only increased because of declines in child mortality.

This is part of what happened. Child mortality used to be high and contributed significantly to short lifespans in the past, and it has declined greatly over time.

But, especially in recent decades, child mortality declines have contributed much less to increasing life expectancy8, and large declines in mortality are seen across all age groups.

You can see this in the chart. It shows the total life expectancy for people who have already survived to older ages.

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This dataset of U.S. mortality trends since 1900 highlights the differences in age-adjusted death rates and life expectancy at birth by race and sex. Age-adjusted death rates (deaths per 100,000) after 1998 are calculated based on the 2000 U.S. standard population. Populations used for computing death rates for 2011–2017 are postcensal estimates based on the 2010 census, estimated as of July 1, 2010. Rates for census years are based on populations enumerated in the corresponding censuses. Rates for noncensus years between 2000 and 2010 are revised using updated intercensal population estimates and may differ from rates previously published. Data on age-adjusted death rates prior to 1999 are taken from historical data (see References below). Life expectancy data are available up to 2017. Due to changes in categories of race used in publications, data are not available for the black population consistently before 1968, and not at all before 1960. More information on historical data on age-adjusted death rates is available at https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/mortality/hist293.htm. SOURCES CDC/NCHS, National Vital Statistics System, historical data, 1900-1998 (see https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/mortality_historical_data.htm); CDC/NCHS, National Vital Statistics System, mortality data (see http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/deaths.htm); and CDC WONDER (see http://wonder.cdc.gov). REFERENCES National Center for Health Statistics, Data Warehouse. Comparability of cause-of-death between ICD revisions. 2008. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/mortality/comparability_icd.htm. National Center for Health Statistics. Vital statistics data available. Mortality multiple cause files. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data_access/vitalstatsonline.htm. Kochanek KD, Murphy SL, Xu JQ, Arias E. Deaths: Final data for 2017. National Vital Statistics Reports; vol 68 no 9. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. 2019. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr68/nvsr68_09-508.pdf. Arias E, Xu JQ. United States life tables, 2017. National Vital Statistics Reports; vol 68 no 7. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. 2019. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr68/nvsr68_07-508.pdf. National Center for Health Statistics. Historical Data, 1900-1998. 2009. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/mortality_historical_data.htm.

Life expectancy at birth is decomposed by potentially avoidable causes of death. Changes in mortality rates for a given cause of death change over time and contribute to the overall change in life expectancy.

Life table data for "Bounce backs amid continued losses: Life expectancy changes since COVID-19"

cc-by Jonas Schöley, José Manuel Aburto, Ilya Kashnitsky, Maxi S. Kniffka, Luyin Zhang, Hannaliis Jaadla, Jennifer B. Dowd, and Ridhi Kashyap. "Bounce backs amid continued losses: Life expectancy changes since COVID-19".

These are CSV files of life tables over the years 2015 through 2021 across 29 countries analyzed in the paper "Bounce backs amid continued losses: Life expectancy changes since COVID-19".

40-lifetables.csv

Life table statistics 2015 through 2021 by sex, region and quarter with uncertainty quantiles based on Poisson replication of death counts. Actual life tables and expected life tables (under the assumption of pre-COVID mortality trend continuation) are provided.

30-lt_input.csv

Life table input data.

id: unique row identifier

region_iso: iso3166-2 region codes

sex: Male, Female, Total

year: iso year

age_start: start of age group

age_width: width of age group, Inf for age_start 100, otherwise 1

nweeks_year: number of weeks in that year, 52 or 53

death_total: number of deaths by any cause

population_py: person-years of exposure (adjusted for leap-weeks and missing weeks in input data on all cause deaths)

death_total_nweeksmiss: number of weeks in the raw input data with at least one missing death count for this region-sex-year stratum. missings are counted when the week is implicitly missing from the input data or if any NAs are encounted in this week or if age groups are implicitly missing for this week in the input data (e.g. 40-45, 50-55)

death_total_minnageraw: the minimum number of age-groups in the raw input data within this region-sex-year stratum

death_total_maxnageraw: the maximum number of age-groups in the raw input data within this region-sex-year stratum

death_total_minopenageraw: the minimum age at the start of the open age group in the raw input data within this region-sex-year stratum

death_total_maxopenageraw: the maximum age at the start of the open age group in the raw input data within this region-sex-year stratum

death_total_source: source of the all-cause death data

death_total_prop_q1: observed proportion of deaths in first quarter of year

death_total_prop_q2: observed proportion of deaths in second quarter of year

death_total_prop_q3: observed proportion of deaths in third quarter of year

death_total_prop_q4: observed proportion of deaths in fourth quarter of year

death_expected_prop_q1: expected proportion of deaths in first quarter of year

death_expected_prop_q2: expected proportion of deaths in second quarter of year

death_expected_prop_q3: expected proportion of deaths in third quarter of year

death_expected_prop_q4: expected proportion of deaths in fourth quarter of year

population_midyear: midyear population (July 1st)

population_source: source of the population count/exposure data

death_covid: number of deaths due to covid

death_covid_date: number of deaths due to covid as of

death_covid_nageraw: the number of age groups in the covid input data

ex_wpp_estimate: life expectancy estimates from the World Population prospects for a five year period, merged at the midpoint year

ex_hmd_estimate: life expectancy estimates from the Human Mortality Database

nmx_hmd_estimate: death rate estimates from the Human Mortality Database

nmx_cntfc: Lee-Carter death rate projections based on trend in the years 2015 through 2019

Deaths

source:

STMF input data series (https://www.mortality.org/Public/STMF/Outputs/stmf.csv)

ONS for GB-EAW pre 2020

CDC for US pre 2020

STMF:

harmonized to single ages via pclm

pclm iterates over country, sex, year, and within-year age grouping pattern and converts irregular age groupings, which may vary by country, year and week into a regular age grouping of 0:110

smoothing parameters estimated via BIC grid search seperately for every pclm iteration

last age group set to [110,111)

ages 100:110+ are then summed into 100+ to be consistent with mid-year population information

deaths in unknown weeks are considered; deaths in unknown ages are not considered

ONS:

data already in single ages

ages 100:105+ are summed into 100+ to be consistent with mid-year population information

PCLM smoothing applied to for consistency reasons

CDC:

The CDC data comes in single ages 0:100 for the US. For 2020 we only have the STMF data in a much coarser age grouping, i.e. (0, 1, 5, 15, 25, 35, 45, 55, 65, 75, 85+). In order to calculate life-tables in a manner consistent with 2020, we summarise the pre 2020 US death counts into the 2020 age grouping and then apply the pclm ungrouping into single year ages, mirroring the approach to the 2020 data

Population

source:

for years 2000 to 2019: World Population Prospects 2019 single year-age population estimates 1950-2019

for year 2020: World Population Prospects 2019 single year-age population projections 2020-2100

mid-year population

mid-year population translated into exposures:

if a region reports annual deaths using the Gregorian calendar definition of a year (365 or 366 days long) set exposures equal to mid year population estimates

if a region reports annual deaths using the iso-week-year definition of a year (364 or 371 days long), and if there is a leap-week in that year, set exposures equal to 371/364*mid_year_population to account for the longer reporting period. in years without leap-weeks set exposures equal to mid year population estimates. further multiply by fraction of observed weeks on all weeks in a year.

COVID deaths

source: COVerAGE-DB (https://osf.io/mpwjq/)

the data base reports cumulative numbers of COVID deaths over days of a year, we extract the most up to date yearly total

External life expectancy estimates

source:

World Population Prospects (https://population.un.org/wpp/Download/Files/1_Indicators%20(Standard)/CSV_FILES/WPP2019_Life_Table_Medium.csv), estimates for the five year period 2015-2019

Human Mortality Database (https://mortality.org/), single year and age tables

In 2024, the average life expectancy for those born in more developed countries was 76 years for men and 82 years for women. On the other hand, the respective numbers for men and women born in the least developed countries were 64 and 69 years. Improved health care has lead to higher life expectancy Life expectancy is the measure of how long a person is expected to live. Life expectancy varies worldwide and involves many factors such as diet, gender, and environment. As medical care has improved over the years, life expectancy has increased worldwide. Introduction to health care such as vaccines has significantly improved the lives of millions of people worldwide. The average worldwide life expectancy at birth has steadily increased since 2007, but dropped during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021. Life expectancy worldwide More developed countries tend to have higher life expectancies, for a multitude of reasons. Health care infrastructure and quality of life tend to be higher in more developed countries, as is access to clean water and food. Africa was the continent that had the lowest life expectancy for both men and women in 2023, while Oceania had the highest for men and Europe and Oceania had the highest for women.

Life expectancy in Japan was 36.4 in the year 1860, and over the course of the next 160 years, it is expected to have increased to 84.4, which is the second highest in the world (after Monaco). Although life expectancy has generally increased throughout Japan's history, there were several times where the rate deviated from its previous trajectory. These changes were a result of the Spanish Flu in the 1910s, the Second World War in the 1940s, and the sharp increase was due to the high rate of industrialization and economic prosperity in Japan, in the mid-twentieth century.

Life expectancy at birth is decomposed by age specific death rates, which can change over time and contribute to the overall change in life expectancy.