Summary: What’s new in WDI?
The “What’s New” series accompanies the World Development Indicators database updates and provides information about which indicators have been added, updated, or removed in the database and details about these changes to help people make better use of the data.
July 2025 update: On July 1, 2025, the World Development Indicators (WDI) database was updated. Data for 2024 for national accounts and population, including GDP and GNI-related indicators, have been released for countries and aggregates and can be accessed through the Open Data site and World Development Indicators database.
The World Bank country income classification for FY26 has been announced through a new blog post. The country and lending groups page also provides a complete list of economies classified by income, region, and lending status.
Data can be accessed via various platforms, including:
1. Data updates
On July 1, 2025, the World Development Indicators (WDI) database was updated. This release features the latest data for:
- ▪ Poverty and Shared Prosperity: The World Bank has updated its international poverty lines, moving from the 2017 to the 2021 Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) data. This update, utilizing current price data, improves the accuracy of global poverty measurements and ensures they reflect today's economic conditions. Adjusting for inflation and national price shifts enhances the relevance and comparability of poverty statistics, supporting timely policy responses to contemporary challenges.
- ▪ Macroeconomic indicators, including national accounts series such as GDP (current US$), GDP, PPP (current international $), and GNI per capita, Atlas method (current US$). Updated indicators from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) encompass Current account balance (BoP, current US$), Central government debt, total (% of GDP), Tax revenue (% of GDP), Inflation, consumer prices (annual %), and Official exchange rate (LCU per US$, period average).
- ▪ Population and demography, covering total population, population by age, sex, and area (urban, rural, and slums) as well as adolescent fertility rates and age dependency ratio.
- ▪ Index-based trade indicators, covering trade in goods and services through volume indices (import and export), as well as commercial service imports and exports. Includes terms of trade and sectoral shares such as transport, travel, insurance, and ICT services.
- ▪ Stock market data, capturing the scale and activity of domestic equity markets, including market capitalization,number of listed companies, trading volume, and turnover ratios.
- ▪ Statistics on health and gender, including the prevalence of diabetes and anemia, as well as the time spent on unpaid domestic and caregiving tasks by sex (female and male).
A complete list of indicators included in this update can be accessed here and the data is available through the Open Data site, DataBank, the Data
Catalog, and via API.
Listed below are the indicator additions and deletions for the second quarter of 2025.
2. New indicators
Enterprise Surveys
The WDI database features selected indicators from the Enterprise Surveys project, which provide insight into many business environment topics such as access to finance, corruption, infrastructure, and performance, among others.
In the most recent update, 13 indicators from Enterprise Surveys were added to the WDI. These are listed below.
Child Malnutrition by sex
To better address gender-specific health disparities from early childhood, new sex-disaggregated indicators for child malnutrition—specifically for overweight and stunting in children under five—are being introduced. These modeled estimates reveal how boys and girls are affected differently by malnutrition.
These indicators enable targeted interventions. For instance, if stunting is more common among boys in a region, nutrition programs can be tailored to their needs. Sex-disaggregated data also helps monitor Sustainable Development Goals focused on ending hunger and achieving gender equality.
3. Methodological updates
Population growth rates
In the past, two methods were used to calculate annual population growth rates: Exponential Growth for country-level data and Linear Growth for aggregate data. While the statistical difference between the linear and exponential annual growth rates is minimal, aggregate data now also employs Exponential Growth to maintain consistency.
Affected series
Gross National Income in constant prices
The formula used to calculate GNI in constant prices has been modified to comply with the international standards. The formula now includes a “trading gain or loss from changes in the terms of trade” element that was previously missing. This doesn’t apply to countries already providing GNI data in constant prices consistent with international standards.
4. New publications
Check out these recent blogs and stories featuring data from the World Development Indicators database:
5. List of discontinued indicators (including WDI Database Archives)
Tariffs
Several tariff indicators have been discontinued from the WDI. This is because missing information on preferential trade agreements can potentially introduce a bias in the data. Moreover, considering evolving research interests and shifts in policy dialogues since the early 1990s, these indicators have diminished in significance, further underscoring the importance of focusing on core tariff indicators.
Enterprise Surveys