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CountryAtlas
Environment · Air

PM2.5 air pollution, mean annual exposure

micrograms per m³ · Annual · 200 of 218 countries (92 %) · 1990–2023
Ranking Download CSV
World median
17.3
across 200 countries, 2023
Latest observation
2023
Source updated
13 Jul 2026
CountryAtlas refreshed
11 Sep 2026
Snapshot 20260911T072322Z

World map

One value per country for the selected year. Hatched = no data.

No data available

Trend

Aggregate across the countries of a group, year by year. Computed by CountryAtlas from country values — no published aggregate is used.

Not enough countries to aggregate this indicator for World.

Highest and lowest

The five leaders and the five trailing countries, 2023.

Full ranking →

Top 5

Bottom 5

Compare countries

Pick up to five countries. Defaults to the three largest economies with data.

No series for the selected countries.

Definition

Definition
Unit
micrograms per m³ (µg/m³)
Frequency
Annual
Aggregation
none · Lower is better
Valid range
0 – 200

Sources & provenance

Every value on this page comes from one of these series, chosen per country by priority.

  1. Priority #1
    World BankWDIEN.ATM.PM25.MC.M3ok
    200 countries · 6,800 obs. · → 2023 · CC BY 4.0

    Population-weighted exposure to ambient PM2.5 pollution is defined as the average level of exposure of a nation's population to concentrations of suspended particles measuring less than 2.5 microns in aerodynamic diameter, which are capable of penetrating deep into the respiratory tract and causing severe health damage. Exposure is calculated by weighting mean annual concentrations of PM2.5 by population in both urban and rural areas. Source: Global Burden of Disease Study 2023 (GBD 2023) Air Pollution Exposure Estimates and Risk Curves 1990-2023, GBD Collaborator Network, uri: https://ghdx.healthdata.org/record/ihme-data/gbd-2023-air-pollution-exposure-estimates-1990-2023, note: Need to create account to retrieve data., publisher: Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), date accessed: 2026-04-03, date published: 2026-01-23

    Open at source

Series-level selection: for each country the whole series comes from the highest-priority source that has any non-forecast value for it. If a lower-priority source is more than three years fresher, the freshest source wins instead. Non-chosen values are kept as alternatives, never discarded.

Countries without data

Typical reasons: the source does not survey small territories or micro-states; the statistical office reports with a lag of one to three years; the series is only compiled for member countries of the source organisation (OECD, EU, Eurostat); or a value exists but failed validation and is quarantined rather than shown.

Downloads & API

Every observation for this indicator, all countries and years, with provenance columns.

Download CSV Download JSON

API example

One country, full history. Replace CAN by any ISO3 code or slug.

bash
curl -s "https://www.countryatlas.co/api/v1/series?country=CAN&indicator=pm25-exposure" | jq '.series[0] | {country: .country.name, unit, last: .stats.last, source: .provenance.source_name}'

API documentation →