World Bank Open Data · CC BY 4.0 Some World Bank indicators are published with a lag. The site always shows the latest actually available year for each country and indicator.
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Countries with the highest
Rural population (% of total population)

In 2021, Papua New Guinea leads Rural population (% of total population) with 86. Liechtenstein follows at 85, and the gap between the top two positions is 0. This page is built for long-tail search demand and links to archives and country profiles.

Year archive

Latest available year 2025 2024 2023 2022 2021 2020

Ranking leaders

0.021.442.864.285.6Papua New GuineaPapua New Guinea: 8685.6LiechtensteinLiechtenstein: 8585.3MalawiMalawi: 8483.5NigerNiger: 8382.8SamoaSamoa: 8282.4Sri LankaSri Lanka: 8080.2South SudanSouth Sudan: 8079.5BurundiBurundi: 7978.9TongaTonga: 7978.7EthiopiaEthiopia: 7877.9VanuatuVanuatu: 7877.7Micronesia, Fed. Sts.Micronesia, Fed. Sts.: 7877.6

Full table

#CountryValue
101 Serbia 39
102 North Macedonia 38
103 French Polynesia 38
104 Aruba 38
105 Morocco 38
106 Tuvalu 37
107 Gambia, The 37
108 Korea, Dem. People's Rep. 37
109 Ecuador 37
110 South Africa 37
111 Congo, Rep. 36
112 Ireland 36
113 China 35
114 Montenegro 35
115 Armenia 35
116 Panama 34
117 Suriname 34
118 Nepal 34
119 Botswana 33
120 Cyprus 33
121 Paraguay 33
122 New Caledonia 33
123 Sao Tome and Principe 32
124 Latvia 32
125 Lithuania 32
126 Angola 32
127 Austria 31
128 Mongolia 31
129 Tunisia 31
130 Ukraine 31
131 Italy 31
132 Iraq 30
133 Estonia 30
134 Hungary 30
135 Bolivia 30
136 Equatorial Guinea 29
137 Dominica 28
138 Djibouti 28
139 Czechia 27
140 Dominican Republic 27
141 Syrian Arab Republic 27
142 Bulgaria 27
143 Finland 27
144 Algeria 26
145 El Salvador 26
146 Cabo Verde 26
147 Russian Federation 25
148 Brunei Darussalam 25
149 Malaysia 24
150 Iran, Islamic Rep. 24

Analytical takeaways

  • Papua New Guinea leads the global ranking for Rural population (% of total population) in 2021, with a lead of 0 over the next country.
  • The visible slice on this page covers 12 countries, and the lower edge of that slice currently sits with Micronesia, Fed. Sts. at 78.
  • The ranking page acts as a high-intent entry point into country+indicator pages, year archives, and thematic collections.