The long view
200 years of human progress, in the numbers
These are the trajectories Hans Rosling built Factfulness around — the changes so slow and so vast the news never shows them. Extreme poverty, child mortality and illiteracy have collapsed; one metric, CO₂, is the honest counterweight that got worse. Figures are well-established historical estimates, approximate by design, and anything past today is projection, not data. Open the interactive 1800→2100 slider →
88% in 1800 → 9.0% in 2024, projected 7.0% by 2030 — improved dramatically. Understand →
Source: Our World in Data (Moatsos), World Bank. Historical estimates, approximate.
43% in 1800 → 3.6% in 2024, projected 3.1% by 2030 — improved dramatically. Understand →
Source: Gapminder, UN IGME. Historical estimates, approximate.
11% in 1800 → 87% in 2024, projected 90% by 2030 — improved dramatically. Understand →
Source: Our World in Data, UNESCO. Historical estimates, approximate.
29 yrs in 1800 → 73 yrs in 2024, projected 82 yrs by 2100 — improved dramatically. Understand →
Source: Our World in Data, UN WPP. Historical estimates, approximate.
283 ppm in 1800 → 422 ppm in 2024, projected 475 ppm by 2050 — moved the wrong way. Understand →
Source: Ice cores + Mauna Loa (NOAA). Historical estimates, approximate.