🌅 Reaching Peak Population

SOURCE

UN DESA, Population Division

WHAT TO KNOW

• As of 2024, 63 countries and territories around the world—containing 28% of the world’s population—have reached their peak population numbers, up from just 14 in the 1980s. The countries that have already reached peak population include some of the world’s most populous, like China, Germany, Japan, and Russia.

WHY IT MATTERS

• The world’s population is expected to climb from 8.2 billion in 2024 to a peak of 10.3 billion in the mid-2080s, after which it’ll return to around 10.2 billion by the end of the century. The U.N. report suggests there’s an 80% chance the world will reach its peak population sometime this century, a significant change from a decade ago, when the U.N. placed the likelihood at around 30%.

CONNECT THE DOTS

• Contemporary populations reach peak size before plateauing and declining as a consequence of the historic demographic transition toward longer lives and smaller families, which the report describes as a “universal feature” of social and economic development in the modern world. Once a population reaches its peak size, it will either stabilize with a growth rate near zero or decrease in size as its growth rate becomes negative.