The Global Religious Landscape

Worldwide, more than 8-in-10 people identify with a religious group. A comprehensive demographic study of more than 230 countries and territories conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life (@pewforum) estimates there are 5.8 billion religiously affiliated adults and children around the globe, representing 84% of the 2010 world population of 6.9 billion.

The demographic study – based on an analysis of more than 2,500 censuses, surveys, and population registers – finds

·         2.2 billion Christians (32% of the world’s population)

·         1.6 billion Muslims (23%)

·         1 billion Hindus (15%)

·         nearly 500 million Buddhists (7%)

·         14 million Jews (0.2%) around the world as of 2010.

In addition, more than 400 million people (6%) practice various folk or traditional religions, including African traditional religions, Chinese folk religions, Native American religions, and Australian aboriginal religions. An estimated 58 million people – slightly less than 1% of the global population – belong to other religions, including the Baha’i faith, Jainism, Sikhism, Shintoism, Taoism, Tenrikyo, Wicca, and Zoroastrianism, to mention just a few.

Read this in full.

Also see the Religion News Service (@ReligionNewsNow) article, “The ‘nones’ now form the world’s third-largest ‘religion’.”

And see our previous blogpost, "Religiosity Declines Worldwide; Atheism on the Rise."

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