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If you ask people about whether the world as a whole is getting better or worse, most people say the latter. People are generally pessimistic about global or societal progress.

But they are typically much more optimistic about improvements in their own lives.

In the chart, you can see what share of people think they would be higher or lower on the “Cantril Ladder” five years in the future. The “Cantril Ladder” asks people to rate their lives on a scale from 0 (the worst possible life) to 10 (the best). Here, respondents were asked to rate where they are now, and where they think they’d be in five years.

As you can see, most people say they will be higher on the ladder across a wide range of countries. They expect their lives to improve.

Of course, this is not true of everyone, everywhere, but these results tend to support the argument that people are generally “individually optimistic, but societally pessimistic”.

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In 2008, Bhutan started measuring the “Gross Happiness Index” as an official metric to track the well-being of its population. As a result, it’s often coined the “Land” or “Kingdom of Happiness”.

Bhutan tracks gross happiness with in-depth surveys, which other countries do not. How does it compare across similar metrics where we can make these comparisons? Despite its reputation, it’s actually not an outlier.

Self-reported life satisfaction is one internationally comparable metric measured in the annual World Happiness Report. Respondents in every country are asked to rate their lives based on a 10-step ladder, where 0 represents the worst possible life, and 10 is the best.

Self-reported life satisfaction tends to be higher in richer countries, although there is a spread among countries with similar gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. The chart plots one against the other.

For its income level, Bhutan has a fairly average life satisfaction score; in the global comparison, it’s about as happy as we would expect based on the incomes of people in the country.

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Putting a number on “happiness” is hard. But one way to better understand how satisfied people are with their lives is to ask them.

Self-reported life satisfaction is one key metric that researchers rely on. Respondents are asked to rate their lives on a 10-step ladder, where 0 represents the worst possible life, and 10 is the best.

The chart shows self-reported life satisfaction measured against gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. The two are positively correlated: people in richer countries tend to be more satisfied with their lives.

Of course, income is not the only thing that matters. You can also see the large spread of values for countries with similar levels of GDP per capita. For example, South American countries tend to have higher happiness levels than those in other regions.

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Religion means less to people in some English-speaking countries than it did 30 years ago.

The chart shows a clear downward trend in the share of people who see religion as important in their lives. This is based on surveys across the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, from 1993 to 2022.

The United States stands out as the country with the highest percentage of people who consider religion important, though this has declined from 79% to 61%. The shift was even sharper in Canada, falling from 61% to 35%.

Religion was already less important to people in Australia, the UK, and New Zealand but in all three countries, this share dropped by more than a quarter.

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Free time is important to most people around the world.

As shown on this chart, in many countries, leisure is important to more than 80% of people. This is based on data from the European Values Study and World Values Survey.

However, the percentage of people who find leisure “very important” varies more. In some countries, it is the majority; in others, it is less than a quarter.

People enjoy their free time, but valuing leisure a lot doesn’t mean people value work less or work fewer hours. In countries such as Nigeria, Mexico, and Indonesia, people put a high value on both these aspects of their lives.

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How satisfied are people with their lives? Answering this question can give us important insights into what matters to people and the circumstances that lead to a fulfilled life.

The World Happiness Report has published data on life satisfaction — based on the Gallup World Poll — since 2012 and covers more than 140 countries worldwide. We have just updated our charts with the latest data.

It measures life satisfaction by asking people to rate their lives on a ladder from 0 to 10, where their worst possible life is 0 and their best possible life is 10.

The resulting score is averaged over the last three years to focus on longer-term shifts.

Despite drastic experiences like the COVID-19 pandemic, overall life satisfaction remains remarkably consistent globally. We can also observe correlations with other measures of well-being: healthier and richer countries tend to have higher average life satisfaction scores.

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Most people agree that family is very important, no matter where they live.

Using data from the European Values Study and World Values Survey, the chart shows that a large majority of people worldwide declare family to be important in their lives. This share is above 80% in every country except six.

Only a small percentage of people say they find family “not very important” or “not important at all”.

Despite our disagreements, we should remember how much people across countries and cultures agree on what truly matters to them.

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