How Many People Have Ever Lived on Earth?

How many people have ever lived? The best answer science has: about 117 billion. You may have heard that more people are alive today than have ever died. Sounds impressive, but it is wrong. The roughly 8.2 billion people alive right now are only about 7 percent of everyone who has ever been born. For every living person, there are about 14 who came before us. In this post, we show you how researchers calculate that number, why almost half of all humans were born before the year 1, and how many more are still to come.

The answer: about 117 billion people

According to estimates by the Population Reference Bureau, about 117 billion people have been born so far. Around 8.2 billion of them are alive today, which is just under 7 percent. The number comes from a model that runs through all of human history, starting around 190,000 B.C.E.

The Population Reference Bureau, or PRB, is a research organization in Washington, D.C. Demographer Carl Haub first ran the calculation in 1995. It was last updated in 2022. The result: about 117 billion births since modern humans appeared.

For context: Nobody counted these people. For more than 99 percent of human history, there is no population data at all. So 117 billion is an estimate. But it is built on clear assumptions, and experts consider the order of magnitude solid.

Are more people alive today than have ever died?

This myth has been around since the 1970s. The idea sounds logical at first: The world population is growing so fast that the living should overtake the dead at some point. The math shows the opposite.

About 117 billion births minus about 8.2 billion people alive today leaves roughly 109 billion dead. That means about 14 dead for every living person. And that will not change. The UN expects the world population to stop growing at around 10 billion. That is nowhere near 109 billion. The living will never outnumber the dead.

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How do you even calculate how many people have ever lived?

The PRB model starts around 190,000 B.C.E. That is roughly when modern humans appeared, based on current research. As a starting point, the researchers assume a symbolic two people. From there, they apply birth rates that fit each era.

For early human history, they assume about 80 births per 1,000 people per year. That many were needed just for the species to survive. Life expectancy at birth was only about 10 years for most of human history, estimates suggest. Mostly because so many children died young. For comparison: Today, 35 to 45 births per 1,000 people already counts as a very high rate.

Around 8000 B.C.E., an estimated 5 million people lived on Earth. By the year 1, it was already about 300 million. The 1 billion mark was not passed until around 1800. Today we are at roughly 8.2 billion.

Almost half of all humans were born before the year 1

Sounds crazy, but it is right there in the model: By the year 1, about 55 billion people had already been born, according to PRB. That is almost 47 percent of all births ever. The reason is the enormous time span. Almost 200,000 years lie between 190,000 B.C.E. and the year 1. The world population was small, but high birth rates add up to a huge number over that much time.

For context: Everything since the year 1, meaning the Roman Empire, the Middle Ages, industrialization, and the present day, covers only about 1 percent of human history. But the other half of all humans was born in that 1 percent.

How many more people are coming?

The world population passed the 8 billion mark in 2022. Right now, about 8.2 billion people live on Earth. The most populous country is India with about 1.46 billion people, just ahead of China with around 1.41 billion. The United States is third with about 342 million.

And it keeps going: By 2050, about 121 billion people will have been born in total, according to the PRB projection. The share of people alive then will rise to about 8 percent of everyone ever born. If you are alive today, you belong to a surprisingly large minority of human history.

Remember one number: 117 billion people have ever been born, and only 7 percent of them are alive right now. If questions like this hook you, read The Oldest Cities in the World or How Old Is the Earth Really? Or test yourself right away with our history estimation questions.