Bachelor's or Higher Attainment, 2020

Showing 25 of 89 countries · select a heading to sort

Bachelor's or Higher Attainment, 2020: every country, as published by UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS).

Positionderived	Country	Adults 25+ who completed a bachelor's degree or higher (%)	Female	Male	Source (UIS footnote)
1	SwitzerlandCHEWestern Europe	40.41	35.240	45.742	UIS based on CHE - LFS - Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
2	LithuaniaLTUNorthern Europe	38.10	41.393	34.140	Source: Labour Force Survey
3	United StatesUSANorthern America	37.52	38.320	36.669	Source: March 2020 Supplement of the Current Population Survey (CPS)
4	United KingdomGBRNorthern Europe	37.28	38.787	35.708	Qualifier: Proportion of population with unknown educational attainment greater than 5%. Source: Labour Force Survey
5	IrelandIRLNorthern Europe	37.22	38.925	35.432	UIS based on IRL - LFS - EU Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
6	LuxembourgLUXWestern Europe	37.12	35.767	38.463	UIS based on LUX - LFS - EU Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
7	IcelandISLNorthern Europe	36.62	41.949	31.650	Qualifier: Data for population 25 to 74 years. Source: Labour force survey
8	IsraelISRWestern Asia	36.51	39.715	33.097	UIS based on ISR - LFS - Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
9	BelgiumBELWestern Europe	35.47	37.808	33.025	UIS based on BEL - LFS - EU Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
10	AustraliaAUSAustralia and New Zealand	35.02	38.294	31.622	Qualifier: Data for population 25 to 74 years. Source: Survey of Education and Work (May 2020)
11	NetherlandsNLDWestern Europe	34.77	33.339	36.257	Source: Labour Force Survey
12	South KoreaKOREastern Asia	33.87	28.658	39.210	UIS based on KOR - LFS - Economically Active Population Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
13	GeorgiaGEOWestern Asia	33.16	34.305	31.809	UIS based on GEO - LFS - Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
14	DenmarkDNKNorthern Europe	33.09	37.948	28.235	Qualifier: Data for population 25 to 74 years. Source: Labour force survey
15	SingaporeSGPSouth-eastern Asia	32.98	31.733	34.357	Source: Census
16	MongoliaMNGEastern Asia	32.60	37.494	27.248	Source: Population and Housing Census
17	SwedenSWENorthern Europe	32.54	—	27.007	UIS based on SWE - LFS - EU Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
18	New ZealandNZLAustralia and New Zealand	32.28	35.555	28.849	Source: HLFS is a quarterly survey (the estimates are an average of the 4 quarters in 2020)
19	Saudi ArabiaSAUWestern Asia	31.05	32.261	30.294	Source: Labour Force Survey
20	CanadaCANNorthern America	30.97	32.290	29.598	UIS based on CAN - LFS - Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
21	EstoniaESTNorthern Europe	30.85	34.319	26.734	Source: Survey of Statistical activity 30101 'Population'
22	FinlandFINNorthern Europe	30.29	32.363	28.126	UIS based on FIN - LFS - EU Labour Force Survey: ILO Harmonized Microdata, https://ilostat.ilo.org/ | Age coverage - minimum age: 15 years old | Age coverage - maximum age: None
23	CuraçaoCUWCaribbean	30.17	30.820	29.319	Qualifier: Proportion of population with unknown educational attainment greater than 5%. Source: Census
24	CyprusCYPWestern Asia	29.80	30.502	29.040	Source: Labour Force Survey
25	GermanyDEUWestern Europe	28.35	24.234	32.667	Source: Labour Force Survey (Microcensus)

A higher value is the better result. The middle country reads 20.98. “Shared” marks a value another country also holds.

Each measure’s ends

• Female

  HighestIceland41.949

  LowestMalawi0.619

  Middle country: 21.836

• Male

  HighestSwitzerland45.742

  LowestSri Lanka0.767

  Middle country: 19.757

• +20 / −44countries joined / left
• 69values changed, of 69 in both
• 54 · 15rose · fell
• 0unchanged

+ Afghanistan+ Bahrain+ China+ Costa Rica+ Curaçao+ Ecuador+ Estonia+ United Kingdom+ Gambia+ Japan+ Saint Lucia+ Mexico+ Mozambique+ Montserrat+ Malawi+ New Zealand+ Oman+ Palau+ Puerto Rico+ San Marino− United Arab Emirates− Azerbaijan− Benin− Burkina Faso− Bangladesh− Bahamas− Belarus− Central African Republic− Cuba− Dominican Republic− Algeria− Ethiopia− Guatemala− Guyana− Honduras− Lebanon− Liberia− Latvia− Maldives− Marshall Islands− Myanmar− Malaysia− New Caledonia− Niger− Nigeria− Norway− Pakistan− Panama− Senegal− Sierra Leone− São Tomé and Príncipe− Turks and Caicos Islands− Chad− Togo− Thailand− Turkmenistan− Tonga− Tunisia− Uganda− Ukraine− Uruguay− Uzbekistan− Samoa− Zimbabwe

Changes in value, not in places: a country’s place also moves when others do. Every country’s full history is charted on the statistic page.

• .csv

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  89 rows · 16 KB · UTF-8, opens in Excel

  Opens with 11 lines of source notes; the table starts on row 13.

  Download bachelors-attainment-2020-nations-inquiry.csv
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  The publisher’s original

  UIS’s own file, on its own site.

  indicators

What this site changed: Reshaped into one row per country: regional and income-group totals are left out, only the columns listed are kept, each row gets its ISO 3166 code, and some country names are brought to one spelling. No value is recalculated, rescaled or rounded.

Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0. Share, adapt and use commercially with credit — and anything you publish that adapts it must carry the same licence.

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