Unemployment Rate by Country – Global Unemployment Tracker

Source: The World Bank: World Development Indicators: ILO Labour Force Statistics database (LFS), International Labour Organization. Indicators: SL.UEM.TOTL.NE.ZS (total unemployment, percentage of total labour force) and SL.UEM.1524.NE.ZS (youth unemployment, percentage of labour force ages 15–24). These are annual national estimates. They are not the separate ILO modeled-estimate series and are not seasonally adjusted monthly headline releases.

The unemployment rate measures people without work who are available and seeking work as a share of the labour force, rather than the entire population. Youth unemployment uses the youth labour force as its denominator. National age limits, definitions, surveys and coverage may differ; same-year values alone do not make all national estimates fully comparable. Unemployment does not measure every form of labour underutilization or job quality. Read the official metadata before interpreting differences.

The tracker does not estimate, interpolate or carry forward missing values, combine national and modeled estimates, or turn missing observations into zeros. The annual-change view is a Silver Dominion calculation: the selected rate minus the rate in the exact preceding calendar year, in percentage points. Source flags are preserved; a reported break in the current year suppresses that change. The API may not identify every historical methodology break. Histories can be revised by the source.

Latest per economy shows each economy’s own latest completed calendar year available in the source; years may differ substantially. Select an explicit year for a same-year overview. Common year selects the latest year shared by the primary economies with data for the selected group and view, and reports participation. The history panel remains independent of the overview-year filter. Older observations (more than two years behind the current year) and source verifications older than seven days are labelled.

The euro area is the World Bank’s EMU aggregate, with membership and weighting defined by the source. It is not the European Union and overlaps its member countries. It is not calculated by averaging national unemployment percentages. Other regional and income aggregates are excluded. The catalog includes countries, territories and the euro-area aggregate with at least one available total or youth observation; availability and history lengths vary.

In the default ordering, the first cards match the shared primary selection in the companion Silver Dominion tools: United States, China, Euro Area, Japan, United Kingdom, India, Canada, Brazil, South Korea, Mexico, Australia, Switzerland, Poland, Sweden and Israel. This default selection is not an unemployment ranking. Phones initially show the same first eight. Highest, lowest and alphabetical sorting reorder all available economies, including the first visible cards; Show more continues in the selected order. Unavailable values sort last. Latest-per-economy rankings may compare observations from different years. Other economies are also available through search, the country selector and the full overview.

One shared daily check of the official country catalog and both annual series runs through WordPress cron, requiring site traffic or a host cron. Checking daily does not mean the provider releases new annual figures daily. The bundled snapshot works immediately; failed, incomplete or older responses retain previously verified histories. Source verification dates, WDI dataset update dates and observation years are distinct. Visitors read a shared local cache and do not contact the provider directly.

Data attribution: The World Bank: World Development Indicators: ILO Labour Force Statistics (LFS). These indicators are identified as CC BY 4.0; retain attribution and comply with the World Bank dataset terms, including attribution when redistributing. Silver Dominion independently formats the data and calculates annual changes. Neither the World Bank nor ILO endorses this tool. No logos or implied affiliation are used. Code is GPL-2.0-or-later; the data retain their own terms. Information only, not investment advice.

• World Bank — total unemployment data
• World Bank — youth unemployment data
• Official definitions, coverage and limitations
• ILO rights and permissions