IBRD only - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in IBRD only was 73.70 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 73.70 in 2020 and a minimum value of 48.68 in 1960.

Definition: Life expectancy at birth indicates the number of years a newborn infant would live if prevailing patterns of mortality at the time of its birth were to stay the same throughout its life.

Source: (1) United Nations Population Division. World Population Prospects: 2019 Revision, or derived from male and female life expectancy at birth from sources such as: (2) Census reports and other statistical publications from national statistical offices, (3)

See also:

Year Value
1960 48.68
1961 49.20
1962 49.79
1963 50.53
1964 51.40
1965 52.36
1966 53.37
1967 54.37
1968 55.33
1969 56.18
1970 56.98
1971 57.68
1972 58.32
1973 58.93
1974 59.53
1975 60.05
1976 60.58
1977 61.06
1978 61.51
1979 61.92
1980 62.29
1981 62.67
1982 63.03
1983 63.34
1984 63.63
1985 63.96
1986 64.34
1987 64.64
1988 64.93
1989 65.18
1990 65.43
1991 65.67
1992 65.85
1993 66.02
1994 66.27
1995 66.54
1996 66.87
1997 67.21
1998 67.52
1999 67.77
2000 68.05
2001 68.34
2002 68.62
2003 68.90
2004 69.21
2005 69.50
2006 69.83
2007 70.16
2008 70.48
2009 70.83
2010 71.16
2011 71.51
2012 71.83
2013 72.15
2014 72.43
2015 72.70
2016 72.96
2017 73.21
2018 73.41
2019 73.62
2020 73.70

Development Relevance: Mortality rates for different age groups (infants, children, and adults) and overall mortality indicators (life expectancy at birth or survival to a given age) are important indicators of health status in a country. Because data on the incidence and prevalence of diseases are frequently unavailable, mortality rates are often used to identify vulnerable populations. And they are among the indicators most frequently used to compare socioeconomic development across countries.

Limitations and Exceptions: Annual data series from United Nations Population Division's World Population Prospects are interpolated data from 5-year period data. Therefore they may not reflect real events as much as observed data.

Statistical Concept and Methodology: Life expectancy at birth used here is the average number of years a newborn is expected to live if mortality patterns at the time of its birth remain constant in the future. It reflects the overall mortality level of a population, and summarizes the mortality pattern that prevails across all age groups in a given year. It is calculated in a period life table which provides a snapshot of a population's mortality pattern at a given time. It therefore does not reflect the mortality pattern that a person actually experiences during his/her life, which can be calculated in a cohort life table. High mortality in young age groups significantly lowers the life expectancy at birth. But if a person survives his/her childhood of high mortality, he/she may live much longer. For example, in a population with a life expectancy at birth of 50, there may be few people dying at age 50. The life expectancy at birth may be low due to the high childhood mortality so that once a person survives his/her childhood, he/she may live much longer than 50 years.

Aggregation method: Weighted average

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Health Indicators

Sub-Topic: Mortality