Ranked: happiest countries in the world 2022

Finland tops the rankings of the happiest countries in the world for the fifth year running

Happiness is a nebulous thing; hard to grasp and harder to hold onto. Scientists, economists and philosophers have defined it through the ages as a combination of different things, among them health, wealth, companionship and security.

Ever since 2011, when the United Nations (UN) adopted a resolution sponsored by Bhutan, entitled ‘Happiness: towards a holistic approach to development’, governments have worked to give more weight to happiness and well-being when determining how to achieve and measure social and economic development.

The Tiger's Nest in Bhutan — S_jakkarin/Shutterstock Bhutan pioneered recognising happiness and well-being

As such, various indices attempt to rank the happiest countries in the world on an annual basis. Now in its 10th year, the World Happiness Report from the UN’s Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) is particularly interesting as it ranks 146 countries by how happy their citizens perceive themselves to be.

“A decade ago, governments around the world expressed the desire to put happiness at the heart of the global development agenda, and they adopted a UN General Assembly resolution for that purpose. The World Happiness Report grew out of that worldwide determination to find the path to greater global well-being. Now, at a time of pandemic and war, we need such an effort more than ever. And the lesson of the World Happiness Report over the years is that social support, generosity to one another, and honesty in government are crucial for well-being. World leaders should take heed. Politics should be directed as the great sages long ago insisted: to the well-being of the people, not the power of the rulers.”
Jeffrey Sachs, World Happiness Report

The SDSN employs an international group of economists, neuroscientists and statisticians to survey citizens on their subjective wellbeing to produce a comprehensive annual list of the happiest countries in the world.

Assessing happiness

SDSN highlights that its rankings are not an index like the longer running Human Development Index (HDI) and more recent Happy Planet Index (HPI). These are often influenced by private sponsors and only partly draw on self-assessment – or make no use of it at all.

SDSN emphasises that its findings draw heavily on data from population samples in each country, using a life evaluation survey to produce subjective well-being data.

The report principally relies on asking a straightforward, subjective question of more than 1,000 people in each country:

“Imagine a ladder, with steps numbered from 0 at the bottom to 10 at the top.
The top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you. On which step of the ladder would you say you personally feel you stand at this time?”
World Happiness Report

That is not to say the report is without a scientific basis. Economic and social factors are considered along with the survey (namely GDP per capita, social support, life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity and perceptions of corruption), but the focus is on how happy citizens say they are; not how happy statisticians think they should be.

10 happiest countries

Once again, Finland is named the happiest country in the world. Rounding out the rest of the top 10 are countries that have consistently ranked among the happiest.

A northern lights scene from Finland – the happiest country in the world 2022 — DENIS BELITSKY/SHUTTERSTOCK Finland remains the world’s happiest country

10 unhappiest countries

At the other end of the table, war-scarred Afghanistan remains last as its humanitarian crisis continues to deepen after the Taliban returned to power in 2021.

A mountain scene from Romania – one of the most improved in this year's happiest countries index — Roberto Sorin/Shutterstock Romania recorded one of the biggest improvements in wellbeing

The geography of happiness

Unsurprisingly, there is a strong correlation between unhappiness and the world’s poorest and most dangerous countries. Eight of the 10 unhappiest nations are in Africa with the other two, Afghanistan and Lebanon, respectively facing political and financial instability. This year’s report was compiled before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Eight of the 10 happiest countries are European nations with only Israel and New Zealand from outside Europe. The UK remains in 17th place while the USA is ranked 16th, up three places from last year and the highest-placed country in the Americas after Canada in 15th. France climbed to 20th, its highest position yet. Australia is 12th.

The highest-ranked country in the Middle East is Bahrain (21) with Taiwan (26) and Singapore (27) the happiest countries in Asia. Costa Rica (23) is the happiest in Latin America with Uruguay (30) the highest-placed in South America. Mauritius (52) is the happiest African nation in the ranking.

In terms of the score, Bulgaria (5.3), Romania (6.4) and Serbia (6.1) recorded the biggest improvements while Afghanistan (2.4), Lebanon (2.9) and Venezuela (4.9) recorded the largest declines.

Happiest countries in the world 2022 – complete rankings

The World Happiness Report compiles data from the last three years of available surveys. The overall happiness scores are calculated from the average of the six factors mentioned above.

Rank	Country	Score
1	Finland	7.821
2	Denmark	7.636
3	Iceland	7.557
4	Switzerland	7.512
5	Netherlands	7.415
6	Luxembourg*	7.404
7	Sweden	7.384
8	Norway	7.365
9	Israel	7.364
10	New Zealand	7.200
11	Austria	7.163
12	Australia	7.162
13	Ireland	7.041
14	Germany	7.034
15	Canada	7.025
16	USA	6.977
17	UK	6.943
18	Czechia	6.920
19	Belgium	6.805
20	France	6.687
21	Bahrain	6.647
22	Slovenia	6.630
23	Costa Rica	6.582
24	UAE	6.576
25	Saudi Arabia	6.523
26	Taiwan	6.512
27	Singapore	6.480
28	Romania	6.477
29	Spain	6.476
30	Uruguay	6.474
31	Italy	6.467
32	Kosovo	6.455
33	Malta	6.447
34	Lithuania	6.446
35	Slovakia	6.391
36	Estonia	6.341
37	Panama	6.309
38	Brazil	6.293
39	Guatemala*	6.262
40	Kazakhstan	6.234
41	Cyprus	6.221
42	Latvia	6.180
43	Serbia	6.178
44	Chile	6.172
45	Nicaragua	6.165
46	Mexico	6.128
47	Croatia	6.125
48	Poland	6.123
49	El Salvador	6.120
50	Kuwait*	6.106
51	Hungary	6.086
52	Mauritius	6.071
53	Uzbekistan	6.063
54	Japan	6.039
55	Honduras	6.022
56	Portugal	6.016
57	Argentina	5.967
58	Greece	5.948
59	South Korea	5.935
60	Philippines	5.904
61	Thailand	5.891
62	Moldova	5.857
63	Jamaica	5.850
64	Kyrgyzstan	5.828
65	Belarus*	5.821
66	Colombia	5.781
67	Bosnia and Herz.	5.768
68	Mongolia	5.761
69	Dominican Republic	5.737
70	Malaysia	5.711
71	Bolivia	5.600
72	China	5.585
73	Paraguay	5.578
74	Peru	5.559
75	Montenegro	5.547
76	Ecuador	5.533
77	Vietnam	5.485
78	Turkmenistan*	5.474
79	North Cyprus*	5.467
80	Russia	5.459
81	Hong Kong (SAR)	5.425
82	Armenia	5.399
83	Tajikistan	5.377
84	Nepal	5.377
85	Bulgaria	5.371
86	Libya*	5.330
87	Indonesia	5.240
88	Ivory Coast	5.235
89	North Macedonia	5.199
90	Albania	5.199
91	South Africa	5.194
92	Azerbaijan*	5.173
93	Gambia*	5.164
94	Bangladesh	5.155
95	Laos	5.140
96	Algeria	5.122
97	Liberia*	5.122
98	Ukraine**	5.084
99	Congo	5.075
100	Morocco	5.060
101	Mozambique	5.048
102	Cameroon	5.048
103	Senegal	5.046
104	Niger*	5.003
105	Georgia	4.973
106	Gabon	4.958
107	Iraq	4.941
108	Venezuela	4.925
109	Guinea	4.891
110	Iran	4.888
111	Ghana	4.872
112	Turkey	4.744
113	Burkina Faso	4.670
114	Cambodia	4.640
115	Benin	4.623
116	Comoros*	4.609
117	Uganda	4.603
118	Nigeria	4.552
119	Kenya	4.543
120	Tunisia	4.516
121	Pakistan	4.516
122	Palestinian Territories*	4.483
123	Mali	4.479
124	Namibia	4.459
125	Eswatini (Swaziland)*	4.396
126	Myanmar	4.394
127	Sri Lanka	4.362
128	Madagascar*	4.339
129	Egypt	4.288
130	Chad*	4.251
131	Ethiopia	4.241
132	Yemen*	4.197
133	Mauritania*	4.153
134	Jordan	4.152
135	Togo	4.112
136	India	3.777
137	Zambia	3.760
138	Malawi	3.750
139	Tanzania	3.702
140	Sierra Leone	3.574
141	Lesotho*	3.512
142	Botswana*	3.471
143	Rwanda*	3.268
144	Zimbabwe	2.995
145	Lebanon	2.955
146	Afghanistan	2.404

* Countries that do not have data from 2020 or 2021. Their averages are based on the 2019 report.

** The latest report was compiled before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Top 10 happiest cities

In 2020, the report ranked individual cities by residents’ perception of their own well-being. Unsurprisingly, Finland’s capital Helsinki was in first place.