Countries by GDP per capita, PPP (current international $)

Ranking 2024

Values shown in per capita.

Analysis

GDP per capita, PPP measures the average economic output per person within a country, expressed in current international dollars adjusted for price differences across countries. The World Bank defines this indicator as gross domestic product expressed in current international dollars, converted by purchasing power parities (PPPs), noting that PPPs account for the different price levels across countries and thus PPP-based comparisons of economic output are more appropriate for comparing the output of economies and the average material well-being of their inhabitants than exchange-rate-based conversions. The indicator code is NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.CD. This ranking covers 200 countries, with 188 of 200 (94.0%) reporting data from 2024 and 199 of 200 (99.5%) reporting data from within the last seven years. All datapoints are classified as official quality. The dataset contains 39 extreme outliers beyond the 3-sigma threshold, reflecting the wide dispersion in values from $1,155 to $155,941, a spread of over 13,400%.

The top of the ranking is dominated by small, high-income economies and major financial or energy exporters. Luxembourg ranks 1st at $155,941, followed by Singapore at $150,689 (2nd) and Ireland at $133,437 (3rd). Macao SAR, China ranks 4th at $126,960 and Qatar ranks 5th at $126,046. Norway (7th, $102,038) and Switzerland (8th, $96,498) are the highest-ranked large Western European economies. The United States ranks 12th at $85,810, while Germany ranks 23rd at $73,552 and France ranks 33rd at $62,557. High rankings in this metric are associated with small population size, energy resources, or financial sector concentration, all of which can raise the per-capita figure relative to overall economic size.

The middle of the ranking includes a diverse set of economies. China ranks 83rd at $27,105, placing it between Serbia (75th, $32,832) and Mexico (86th, $26,185). Guyana ranks 16th at $80,155, placing it above established high-income economies including the Netherlands (11th) and Denmark (15th) by a notable margin relative to its regional peers. India ranks 135th at $11,160, while Brazil ranks 94th at $22,338. At the lower end, Sub-Saharan African economies occupy most positions from rank 160 onward. Burundi ranks 199th at $1,195 and Central African Republic ranks 198th at $1,263, just above last-placed South Sudan at $1,155.

PPP-based GDP per capita has known limitations. The conversion relies on PPP estimates that are themselves modeled and subject to revision, particularly for countries with limited price survey data. The metric reflects average output per person and does not capture income distribution within a country; two countries with identical scores can have very different internal inequality profiles. Territories and special administrative regions such as Macao SAR, Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, and Faroe Islands appear in the ranking alongside sovereign states, which affects direct comparisons. Small jurisdictions with concentrated economic activity in finance or energy can show very high per-capita figures that do not generalize to the broader population's living standards. Additionally, 12 of 200 countries lack a 2024 data point and rely on estimates from prior years, introducing a modest timing inconsistency across the ranking.

Methodology

This ranking uses World Bank World Development Indicators, indicator code NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.CD, for the data year 2024. The metric is defined as gross domestic product expressed in current international dollars, converted by purchasing power parities (PPPs). PPPs account for the different price levels across countries and thus PPP-based comparisons of economic output are more appropriate for comparing the output of economies and the average material well-being of their inhabitants than exchange-rate-based conversions. The unit is current international dollars per capita. The dataset covers 200 countries. Coverage viability: 200 countries with data meet the threshold of 80. Recency: 199 of 200 (99.5%) have data from within the last seven years; 188 of 200 (94.0%) have a 2024 data point. Data quality: 100% of datapoints are classified as official, exceeding the 70% threshold. The ranking contains 39 extreme outliers by the 3-sigma criterion, consistent with the large value range of $1,154.89 to $155,941.29 (a spread of approximately 13,403%). Average year-over-year change across the dataset is 7.3%, well within the 50% volatility threshold. No microstates below 1 million population are present in the 200-country set.

Sources

• World Bank