Taps Coogan – September 14th, 2020

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UN demographic estimates predict that the world’s population will most likely peak sometime shortly after year 2100 at around 10.9 billion people. However, every few years the UN population estimates get revised as various demographic factors evolve and, most importantly, fertility rates around the world continue to fall faster than expected.

Based on more recent estimates from the IHME, world population will not peak at roughly 10.9 billion around year 2100 as the UN is currently forecasting, but at 9.7 billion in 2064. IHME also predicts that nearly a quarter of the world will be over 65 by 2100.

The difference between the IHME and UN forecasts has a huge impact on several countries, as the following infographic from Visual Capitalist highlights. Notably, IHME predicts that China’s population will nearly halve from 1.4 billion today to 732 million by 2100. That will mean that both India and Nigeria are likely to surpass China as the world’s first and second most populous countries. The US population will remain mostly unchanged (though increasingly elderly), falling from third most populous to fourth. Russia’s population will fall by over a quarter and Japan’s population will fall by more than half. Half of the world’s most populous counties in 2100 will be in Africa compared to just one today (Nigeria), with Sub-Saharan Africa seeing by far the largest population gains in the world.

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