Our World in Data: charts and datasets on the world’s big trends
A free, openly licensed library of interactive charts on health, energy, food, poverty and more, with each chart's sources and data available to download.
The site: Our World in Data. Cost: Free. Useful for: culture and countries.
What it is
Our World in Data is a non-profit publication that turns research data on large global problems into interactive charts and explanatory articles. Its homepage lists more than 13,000 charts across over 100 topics, plus data explorers that bring related indicators together in one view.
Everything on the site is free to use. Charts, articles and data are published under a CC BY licence unless stated otherwise, so you can reuse them with credit. Each chart has a sources and processing section that shows where the numbers come from, and you can download either the data on display or the full dataset.
Use it for
- Getting a fast, sourced picture of a long-run trend such as energy mix or life expectancy
- Finding a credible chart for a presentation without building one yourself
- Tracing a statistic back to its original source before you rely on it
- Background reading for impact, ESG or public policy work
It is especially useful when you need context rather than precision: how a trend has moved over decades, and which countries stand out.
How to use it
- Search ourworldindata.org for your topic or indicator.
- Open a chart and read its title, units and date range carefully.
- Scroll to the sources and processing section to see who produced the data.
- Use the download option to get the displayed data or the full dataset, which comes as a CSV file with metadata and a README.
- Credit Our World in Data and the original source when you reuse a chart or figure.
Follow the source link at least once for any number you plan to quote. It tells you whether the figure is a measurement, a survey result or an estimate.
Example
A student writing about electric vehicle adoption can search the site, open a relevant chart and check the sources section to see which organisation supplied the figures. Downloading the full data gives a CSV that goes straight into a spreadsheet, ready to compare the countries the essay focuses on.
Watch out for
- The site mostly republishes other organisations’ data, so the original source sets the quality.
- The latest year can lag by a year or more for some indicators.
- The source code for the site’s tools is under a separate licence from the charts and data.
It works well alongside Gapminder, World Bank Open Data and OECD Data.
Checklist
Put it to work
Recap cards
Tap a card to check yourself.
Sources and credits
