Countries by People using safely managed drinking water services, rural (% of rural population)

Ranking 2024

Values shown in %.

Analysis

This metric measures the percentage of rural residents using drinking water from a safely managed source. According to the World Bank World Development Indicators (indicator SH.H2O.SMDW.RU.ZS), this is defined as the percentage of people using drinking water from an improved source that is accessible on premises, available when needed and free from faecal and priority chemical contamination. Improved water sources include piped water, boreholes or tubewells, protected dug wells, protected springs, and packaged or delivered water. The unit is percentage of rural population. The dataset covers 85 countries, all with data from the last 7 years, and 100% of datapoints are classified as official-quality. No extreme outliers were detected at the 3-sigma threshold.

The top of the ranking is dominated by European nations. Hungary and San Marino both score 100% (ranks 1 and 1). Germany follows at rank 3 with 99.64%, Israel at rank 4 with 99.39%, and Spain at rank 5 with 98.60%. Czechia (rank 6, 98.52%), France (rank 7, 98.40%), and Luxembourg (rank 8, 97.90%) also sit above 97%. Ireland at rank 9 reaches 96.14%. The one notable outlier in this group is Turkmenistan at rank 10 with 92.35%, the only non-European country in the top ten, suggesting relatively high rural water infrastructure coverage by regional standards.

The middle of the ranking shows considerable spread. Costa Rica ranks 14th at 81.05%, while India ranks 20th at 72.63% and Brazil ranks 19th at 73.64%, reflecting large rural populations with uneven service coverage. Romania sits at rank 23 with 66.65%, notably lower than neighboring EU members, while Serbia ranks 24th at 66.04%. In the lower half, Indonesia ranks 56th at just 24.36% despite being a large middle-income economy, and Peru ranks 57th at 23.59%. Sub-Saharan African countries cluster at the bottom: Ethiopia ranks 81st at 5.85%, Chad ranks 83rd at 2.65%, the Central African Republic ranks 84th at 2.24%, and the Democratic Republic of Congo ranks last at 0.51%.

Several data limitations apply to this metric. Coverage is limited to 85 countries, meaning large portions of the world lack comparable data and are excluded from rankings. The metric measures access at the time of survey but does not capture service reliability beyond the 'available when needed' criterion or seasonal variation. Reporting is based on household surveys and administrative data that vary in methodology and frequency across countries, which can introduce inconsistencies between national estimates. Small or landlocked territories such as San Marino and Turks and Caicos Islands (rank 33, 55.65%) may have structural differences in how rural populations are defined and surveyed. The metric also does not distinguish between degrees of contamination risk beyond the binary classification of safe versus unsafe.

Methodology

Data are drawn from the World Bank World Development Indicators, indicator code SH.H2O.SMDW.RU.ZS, with a reference year of 2024. The metric is defined as the percentage of people using drinking water from an improved source that is accessible on premises, available when needed and free from faecal and priority chemical contamination. Improved water sources include piped water, boreholes or tubewells, protected dug wells, protected springs, and packaged or delivered water. The ranking covers 85 countries, all of which have data from within the last 7 years (100% recency). All 85 datapoints (100%) meet the official data quality threshold. No extreme outliers were identified using a 3-sigma test. The average year-over-year change across the dataset is 2.0%, indicating stable reporting. Values range from 0.51% (Democratic Republic of Congo) to 100% (Hungary, San Marino), a spread of over 19,000%. Data for 83 of 85 countries (97.6%) originate from the latest reference year. Countries without sufficient data are excluded, limiting global representativeness.

Sources

• World Bank