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worldgovdata

About

About & methodology

worldgovdata standardises official institutional statistics onto one comparable country spine — a single catalogue, country profiles and an analysis workbench, free to use and open by licence.

The country spine

Every source names countries and economies differently. We map them all onto one canonical spine — ISO codes, region and income group — so a value from the World Bank lines up exactly with one from the WHO or UNDP. Aggregates and non-country entities are dropped, and every series is reshaped to the same grain: one value per indicator, country and year. That alignment is what makes any two indicators, or any two countries, directly comparable.

What we serve

We take sources that are freely accessible without an API key and published under a licence that permits reuse; sources that restrict redistribution are left out, however useful the data would be. Only indicators marked redistributable are ever served — enforced at every layer, from the data marts through to every response. Each series carries its provider, unit, coverage and licence, so nothing is shown without its provenance.

How it is built

A scheduled pipeline fetches each source, standardises it onto the spine, and runs contract assertions before anything is published. Each source moves on its own cadence — weekly, monthly or quarterly, following the publisher. If a fetch fails its checks the last good data stays live and the failure is recorded: the site never breaks, and it never quietly serves something wrong. The sources page shows the latest run and data year for every provider.

Attribution

Data belongs to its providers and is reused here under each source’s licence — most commonly CC BY. Attribution renders on every page and travels with every CSV and JSON download, so when you reuse anything from worldgovdata, carry that attribution through.

  • Worldwide Governance IndicatorsWorld Bank, Worldwide Governance Indicators (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • World Development IndicatorsWorld Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • Our World in DataOur World in Data (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • UNDP Human Development Report OfficeUNDP, Human Development Report Office (CC BY 3.0 IGO)CC BY 3.0 IGO
  • INFORM (EC JRC)European Commission, JRC — INFORM (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • Country spineWorld Bank & Datahub country-codesCC BY 4.0
  • ILOSTAT — International Labour OrganizationILOSTAT, International Labour Organization (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • World Bank Poverty and Inequality PlatformWorld Bank, Poverty and Inequality Platform (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • UNICEF Data WarehouseUNICEF Data Warehouse (CC BY 3.0 IGO)CC BY 3.0 IGO
  • UNHCR Refugee Data FinderUNHCR Refugee Data Finder (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • EmberEmber (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • Climate WatchClimate Watch, World Resources Institute (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • Uppsala Conflict Data ProgramUppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP) (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • UN World Population Prospects 2024UN DESA, World Population Prospects 2024 (CC BY 3.0 IGO)CC BY 3.0 IGO
  • Penn World Table 10.01Penn World Table 10.01, Feenstra et al. (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • WHO Global Health ObservatoryWorld Health Organization, Global Health Observatory (GHO)CC BY 4.0
  • UN SDG Global DatabaseUnited Nations Statistics Division, SDG Global DatabaseUN terms of use
  • UNESCO Institute for StatisticsUNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) (CC BY-SA 4.0)CC BY-SA 4.0
  • UN ComtradeUN Comtrade, United Nations Statistics DivisionUN terms of use
  • The DHS ProgramThe DHS Program, ICFDHS terms of use
  • International Monetary FundInternational Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook / GDD / CPI (IMF Terms of Use)IMF terms of use
  • Organisation for Economic Co-operation and DevelopmentOECD (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • Bank for International SettlementsBank for International Settlements (BIS) (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • European Central BankEuropean Central Bank (ECB) — euro foreign-exchange reference rates (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • World Inequality DatabaseWorld Inequality Database (WID.world)Free use, attribution
  • Maddison Project Database 2023Maddison Project Database 2023, Bolt and van Zanden (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • GapminderGapminder (CC BY 4.0); some upstream series are third-partyCC BY 4.0
  • FAOSTATFAO, FAOSTAT (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • EDGAR — EC JRC Community GHG emissionsEuropean Commission, JRC — EDGAR Community GHG emissions (2024)CC BY 4.0
  • Global Carbon BudgetGlobal Carbon Project — Global Carbon Budget (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • IRENA — IRENASTATIRENA, IRENASTAT (International Renewable Energy Agency)Free use, attribution
  • Climate TRACEClimate TRACE (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • WRI Aqueduct 4.0WRI Aqueduct 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • ND-GAIN Country IndexUniversity of Notre Dame — ND-GAIN Country Index (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem)Coppedge et al., V-Dem Country-Year Dataset (Varieties of Democracy Project)Free use, attribution
  • Freedom House — Freedom in the WorldFreedom House, Freedom in the WorldFree for non-commercial use
  • Transparency International — Corruption Perceptions IndexTransparency International, Corruption Perceptions Index (CC BY-ND 4.0)CC BY-ND 4.0
  • International IDEA — GSoD Indices & Voter TurnoutInternational IDEA, Global State of Democracy Indices and Voter Turnout DatabaseNon-commercial terms
  • Fragile States Index (Fund for Peace)The Fund for Peace, Fragile States IndexCC BY-NC-SA 4.0
  • IPU ParlineInter-Parliamentary Union, Parline (data.ipu.org)CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
  • GitHub Innovation GraphGitHub Innovation Graph (CC0)CC0
  • Internet number resources (NRO / RIR statistics)Number Resource Organization (NRO) / RIRs, extended delegated statisticsOpen data
  • PeeringDBPeeringDBCustom terms
  • UNODC Data PortalUnited Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)Custom terms
  • StatCounter GlobalStatsStatCounter GlobalStats (CC BY-SA 3.0)CC BY-SA 3.0
  • World Bank ASPIRE — Social ProtectionWorld Bank, ASPIRE — Atlas of Social Protection (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • World Bank Gender StatisticsWorld Bank, Gender Statistics (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • World Bank Global FindexWorld Bank, Global Findex Database (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • World Bank Women, Business and the LawWorld Bank, Women, Business and the Law (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • IBP Open Budget SurveyInternational Budget Partnership, Open Budget Survey (via World Bank Data360)IBP terms
  • World Bank Climate Change Knowledge PortalWorld Bank, Climate Change Knowledge Portal (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0
  • AMECO — EC Annual Macro-economic DatabaseEuropean Commission, DG ECFIN — AMECOEC reuse policy
  • UN World Urbanization Prospects 2025UN DESA, World Urbanization Prospects 2025 (CC BY 3.0 IGO)CC BY 3.0 IGO
  • OpenAlexOpenAlex (CC0)CC0
  • Small Arms Survey — Global Violent DeathsSmall Arms Survey, Global Violent Deaths database (CC BY 4.0)CC BY 4.0

Corrections

Spotted a value that looks wrong, or a source we should carry? Tell us and we will look into it. We mirror what each publisher reports — corrections to the underlying figures have to come from the source — but mapping and display errors are ours to fix. Get in touch or email [email protected].

worldgovdata is built and maintained by {foways}.