The highest fertility rates in the world
Somalia has the highest fertility rate of any country in 2023, at 6.13 children per woman, about 9.3 times the lowest figure in the world. Almost every country at the top of the table is in sub-Saharan Africa, and almost every one of them is falling.
- 6.13children per woman: Somalia
- 107of 236 above replacement
- 35%of world births are in Africa, 2023
- 48%of world births by 2100, projected
The 25 highest fertility rates, 2023
Children per woman, highest first, from the UN World Population Prospects 2024. Births and the crude birth rate are shown alongside, because high fertility and a large number of births are not the same thing. Several countries near the top of this table have fewer births than a single low-fertility country with a much bigger population.
| # | Country or area | Children per woman | Per 1,000 | Births | Population |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somalia | 6.13 | 43.0 | 789,000 | 18.4M |
| 2 | Chad | 6.12 | 42.4 | 819,000 | 19.3M |
| 3 | Niger | 6.06 | 41.9 | 1,100,000 | 26.2M |
| 4 | DR Congo | 6.05 | 41.3 | 4,370,000 | 106M |
| 5 | Central African Republic | 6.01 | 46.4 | 239,000 | 5.15M |
| 6 | Mali | 5.61 | 40.0 | 951,000 | 23.8M |
| 7 | Angola | 5.12 | 37.6 | 1,380,000 | 36.8M |
| 8 | Burundi | 4.88 | 33.7 | 461,000 | 13.7M |
| 9 | Afghanistan | 4.84 | 35.4 | 1,470,000 | 41.5M |
| 10 | Mozambique | 4.76 | 37.5 | 1,260,000 | 33.6M |
| 11 | Mauritania | 4.70 | 34.4 | 173,000 | 5.02M |
| 12 | Mayotte | 4.62 | 35.4 | 11,200 | 316K |
| 13 | Tanzania | 4.61 | 35.2 | 2,350,000 | 66.6M |
| 14 | Yemen | 4.59 | 35.2 | 1,390,000 | 39.4M |
| 15 | Benin | 4.56 | 33.9 | 478,000 | 14.1M |
| 16 | Nigeria | 4.48 | 33.0 | 7,510,000 | 228M |
| 17 | Sudan | 4.32 | 33.6 | 1,680,000 | 50M |
| 18 | Cameroon | 4.32 | 33.7 | 957,000 | 28.4M |
| 19 | Côte d'Ivoire | 4.28 | 32.0 | 997,000 | 31.2M |
| 20 | Uganda | 4.28 | 35.2 | 1,710,000 | 48.7M |
| 21 | Guinea | 4.22 | 33.9 | 488,000 | 14.4M |
| 22 | Togo | 4.19 | 31.1 | 290,000 | 9.3M |
| 23 | Burkina Faso | 4.19 | 31.6 | 729,000 | 23M |
| 24 | Congo | 4.16 | 30.6 | 189,000 | 6.18M |
| 25 | Zambia | 4.10 | 33.1 | 686,000 | 20.7M |
Where high fertility is now
The top of the table is a region rather than a list: sub-Saharan Africa, with a handful of entries from elsewhere. That is a recent concentration. In 1950 fertility above 5 was normal across Asia and Latin America as well, and the countries that have since fallen furthest, among them Taiwan going from 6.48 to 0.87, were among the highest in the world at the time.
High fertility usually accompanies a young population, and the two together produce a high crude birth rate: Central African Republic records 46.4 births per 1,000 people, against a world average of 16.3. This is the arithmetic behind the shift in where the world's babies are born.
The shift this produces
Africa accounted for 12% of world births in 1950 and 35% in 2023. On the UN's medium projection it passes Asia in 2055 and reaches 48% by 2100, a change in the geography of human birth with no precedent on this map's two-thousand-year timeline.
That is a projection, and it depends on assumptions about how quickly fertility in these countries falls. It is falling: almost every country at the top of the table is lower now than it was in 2000. The projection is a statement about the pace of a decline already under way, not about whether it happens.
Why fertility is higher here
The explanations are the same ones read in reverse: earlier first births, less time in education, lower urbanisation, more limited access to contraception, and child mortality high enough that a larger family is also insurance. The causes of falling fertility covers them, and the same caution applies: these are attributions from demographic research, not things this dataset measures.