In the middle of 2023, about 60 percent of the global population was living in Asia.The total world population amounted to 8.1 billion people on the planet. In other words 4.7 billion people were living in Asia as of 2023. Global populationDue to medical advances, better living conditions and the increase of agricultural productivity, the world population increased rapidly over the past century, and is expected to continue to grow. After reaching eight billion in 2023, the global population is estimated to pass 10 billion by 2060. Africa expected to drive population increase Most of the future population increase is expected to happen in Africa. The countries with the highest population growth rate in 2024 were mostly African countries. While around 1.47 billion people live on the continent as of 2024, this is forecast to grow to 3.9 billion by 2100. This is underlined by the fact that most of the countries wit the highest population growth rate are found in Africa. The growing population, in combination with climate change, puts increasing pressure on the world's resources.

Until the 1800s, population growth was incredibly slow on a global level. The global population was estimated to have been around 188 million people in the year 1CE, and did not reach one billion until around 1803. However, since the 1800s, a phenomenon known as the demographic transition has seen population growth skyrocket, reaching eight billion people in 2023, and this is expected to peak at over 10 billion in the 2080s.

Chart and table of World population from 1950 to 2025. United Nations projections are also included through the year 2100.

Globally, about 25 percent of the population is under 15 years of age and 10 percent is over 65 years of age. Africa has the youngest population worldwide. In Sub-Saharan Africa, more than 40 percent of the population is below 15 years, and only three percent are above 65, indicating the low life expectancy in several of the countries. In Europe, on the other hand, a higher share of the population is above 65 years than the population under 15 years. Fertility rates The high share of children and youth in Africa is connected to the high fertility rates on the continent. For instance, South Sudan and Niger have the highest population growth rates globally. However, about 50 percent of the world’s population live in countries with low fertility, where women have less than 2.1 children. Some countries in Europe, like Latvia and Lithuania, have experienced a population decline of one percent, and in the Cook Islands, it is even above two percent. In Europe, the majority of the population was previously working-aged adults with few dependents, but this trend is expected to reverse soon, and it is predicted that by 2050, the older population will outnumber the young in many developed countries. Growing global population As of 2025, there are 8.1 billion people living on the planet, and this is expected to reach more than nine billion before 2040. Moreover, the global population is expected to reach 10 billions around 2060, before slowing and then even falling slightly by 2100. As the population growth rates indicate, a significant share of the population increase will happen in Africa.

The world's population first reached one billion people in 1803, and reach eight billion in 2023, and will peak at almost 11 billion by the end of the century. Although it took thousands of years to reach one billion people, it did so at the beginning of a phenomenon known as the demographic transition; from this point onwards, population growth has skyrocketed, and since the 1960s the population has increased by one billion people every 12 to 15 years. The demographic transition sees a sharp drop in mortality due to factors such as vaccination, sanitation, and improved food supply; the population boom that follows is due to increased survival rates among children and higher life expectancy among the general population; and fertility then drops in response to this population growth. Regional differences The demographic transition is a global phenomenon, but it has taken place at different times across the world. The industrialized countries of Europe and North America were the first to go through this process, followed by some states in the Western Pacific. Latin America's population then began growing at the turn of the 20th century, but the most significant period of global population growth occurred as Asia progressed in the late-1900s. As of the early 21st century, almost two thirds of the world's population live in Asia, although this is set to change significantly in the coming decades. Future growth The growth of Africa's population, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, will have the largest impact on global demographics in this century. From 2000 to 2100, it is expected that Africa's population will have increased by a factor of almost five. It overtook Europe in size in the late 1990s, and overtook the Americas a decade later. In contrast to Africa, Europe's population is now in decline, as birth rates are consistently below death rates in many countries, especially in the south and east, resulting in natural population decline. Similarly, the population of the Americas and Asia are expected to go into decline in the second half of this century, and only Oceania's population will still be growing alongside Africa. By 2100, the world's population will have over three billion more than today, with the vast majority of this concentrated in Africa. Demographers predict that climate change is exacerbating many of the challenges that currently hinder progress in Africa, such as political and food instability; if Africa's transition is prolonged, then it may result in further population growth that would place a strain on the region's resources, however, curbing this growth earlier would alleviate some of the pressure created by climate change.

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities. Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office. The following dataset from California Current Ecosystem (CCE) contains human population (total) measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities. Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office. The following dataset from California Current Ecosystem (CCE) contains population (urban) measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities. Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office. The following dataset from California Current Ecosystem (CCE) contains human population (total) measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.

Chart and table of World population density from 1950 to 2025. United Nations projections are also included through the year 2100.

In 2022, India overtook China as the world's most populous country and now has almost 1.46 billion people. China now has the second-largest population in the world, still with just over 1.4 billion inhabitants, however, its population went into decline in 2023. Global population As of 2025, the world's population stands at almost 8.2 billion people and is expected to reach around 10.3 billion people in the 2080s, when it will then go into decline. Due to improved healthcare, sanitation, and general living conditions, the global population continues to increase; mortality rates (particularly among infants and children) are decreasing and the median age of the world population has steadily increased for decades. As for the average life expectancy in industrial and developing countries, the gap has narrowed significantly since the mid-20th century. Asia is the most populous continent on Earth; 11 of the 20 largest countries are located there. It leads the ranking of the global population by continent by far, reporting four times as many inhabitants as Africa. The Demographic Transition The population explosion over the past two centuries is part of a phenomenon known as the demographic transition. Simply put, this transition results from a drastic reduction in mortality, which then leads to a reduction in fertility, and increase in life expectancy; this interim period where death rates are low and birth rates are high is where this population explosion occurs, and population growth can remain high as the population ages. In today's most-developed countries, the transition generally began with industrialization in the 1800s, and growth has now stabilized as birth and mortality rates have re-balanced. Across less-developed countries, the stage of this transition varies; for example, China is at a later stage than India, which accounts for the change in which country is more populous - understanding the demographic transition can help understand the reason why China's population is now going into decline. The least-developed region is Sub-Saharan Africa, where fertility rates remain close to pre-industrial levels in some countries. As these countries transition, they will undergo significant rates of population growth

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities. Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office. The following dataset from California Current Ecosystem (CCE) contains number of farms measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.

In 2023, the global population will reach approximately eight billion people. This is double what the population was just 48 years previously, in 1975, when it reached four billion people. When we compare growth rates over the selected periods, it took an average of 12 years per one billion people between 1975 and 2023, which is almost double the rate of the period between 1928 and 1975, and over ten times faster than growth between 1803 and 1928. Additionally, it took almost 700 years for the world population to increase by 250 million people during the Middle Ages, in contrast, an increase of 250 million has been observed every three to four years since the 1960s.

Chart and table of India population from 1950 to 2025. United Nations projections are also included through the year 2100.

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities. Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office. The following dataset from California Current Ecosystem (CCE) contains population (urban) measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.

Over the past 23 years, there were constantly more men than women living on the planet. Of the 8.06 billion people living on the Earth in 2023, 4.05 billion were men and 4.01 billion were women. One-quarter of the world's total population in 2024 was below 15 years.

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities.

Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office.

The following dataset from California Current Ecosystem (CCE) contains human population (total) measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.

Before 2025, the world's total population is expected to reach eight billion. Furthermore, it is predicted to reach over 10 billion in 2060, before slowing again as global birth rates are expected to decrease. Moreover, it is still unclear to what extent global warming will have an impact on population development. A high share of the population increase is expected to happen on the African continent.

1. Conservation of biodiversity in urban environments depends on the responses of species to the intensity of urban development. 'Land sharing' and 'land sparing' represent alternate ends of a gradient that conceptualises a trade-off between the human population and biodiversity. We used a linear optimisation procedure to 1) identify the optimal allocation of land for people and nature, 2) assess whether the optimal allocation is more similar to land sparing or land sharing, and 3) examine how this might change under scenarios of human population growth. 2. We surveyed birds in 28 landscapes, each 25 ha in size, along a gradient of human population density (zero to ~1600 persons/25 ha) in the Greater Melbourne region, Australia. Species' responses to population density were estimated using generalised additive models (GAMs). These relationships were then used to determine the optimal allocation of land among different categories of population density based on maximising a community index, the geometric mean of relative abundance (G) of bird species. 3. Human population density was an important driver of the reporting rate for 28 species. Response curves differed among 'urban avoider', 'urban adapter' and 'urban exploiter' species. For the current human population in the study area, optimal allocation of land included elements of both land sharing and land sparing. However, for scenarios of increased population size, optimal allocation converged upon a land sparing design. 5. Synthesis and applications. Urban areas represent a mosaic of land uses that offer habitats of differing quality. Land sharing, based on sustaining biota amongst residential areas, performed poorly under all scenarios due to its inability to support species that depend on natural or semi-natural habitat. To sustain more than a homogenised avifauna in urban regions, large tracts of natural vegetation are needed within, or adjacent to, the urban environment. Protecting natural areas on urban fringes will be critical to the safeguarding of nature in the future as urban populations and land-use inevitably expand.

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities. Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office. The following dataset from Coweeta (CWT) contains human population (total) measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.

The EcoTrends project was established in 2004 by Dr. Debra Peters (Jornada Basin LTER, USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range) and Dr. Ariel Lugo (Luquillo LTER, USDA-FS Luquillo Experimental Forest) to support the collection and analysis of long-term ecological datasets. The project is a large synthesis effort focused on improving the accessibility and use of long-term data. At present, there are ~50 state and federally funded research sites that are participating and contributing to the EcoTrends project, including all 26 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites and sites funded by the USDA Agriculture Research Service (ARS), USDA Forest Service, US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey (USGS) and numerous universities. Data from the EcoTrends project are available through an exploratory web portal (http://www.ecotrends.info). This web portal enables the continuation of data compilation and accessibility by users through an interactive web application. Ongoing data compilation is updated through both manual and automatic processing as part of the LTER Provenance Aware Synthesis Tracking Architecture (PASTA). The web portal is a collaboration between the Jornada LTER and the LTER Network Office. The following dataset from Coweeta (CWT) contains human population (total) measurements in number units and were aggregated to a yearly timescale.