Compare · UN World Population Prospects 2024

Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia, side by side

The Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2026: half the people are older than 17. Ethiopia: half are older than 20.

UN estimates for mid-2023: Democratic Republic of the Congo 105,789,732 people · Ethiopia 128,691,692

Democratic Republic of the Congo 116 million people Half are older than 17 3 in 100 are 65 or older

Ethiopia 139 million people Half are older than 20 3 in 100 are 65 or older

How to read this: each pyramid stacks a place’s people by age — babies at the bottom, the oldest at the top, men on the left and women on the right. A wide bottom means many children; a wide top means many older people.

Compare shapes Compare sizes

Each bar is a share of its own place’s people, so a small country and a large one can be read side by side.

Year 2026 · UN projection

estimatesprojections

men women projected

Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries

COD × ETH · 2026 · age groups

If each place were 100 people

Shrink each population to 100 people and count them. Dots are children under 15, filled squares are people aged 15 to 64, and open squares are people 65 and over. The picture follows the year slider above.

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Children, under 15: 46
Aged 15 to 64: 51
Aged 65 and over: 3

Ethiopia

Children, under 15: 39
Aged 15 to 64: 58
Aged 65 and over: 3

COD × ETH · families and lifetimes

Children, and how long lives last

If the birth rates of this year held for a whole lifetime, a woman in the Democratic Republic of the Congo would have about 5.8 children and a woman in Ethiopia about 3.7. Life expectancy at birth this year: about 62 years in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, about 68 in Ethiopia.

Children per woman, 2026

Each figure is one child: how many children a woman would have in her lifetime at that year’s rates.

Democratic Republic of the Congo 5.8

Ethiopia 3.7

The dashed line at 2.1 is about what it takes for each generation to replace the one before it, leaving migration aside.

How long a newborn can expect to live, 2026

Each block is ten years of life, if the death rates of that year stayed the same all life long.

Democratic Republic of the Congo 62 years

Ethiopia 68 years

Hatched marks are UN projections (medium variant), not measurements.

COD × ETH · 1950–2100 · how many

How big, and where they are heading

There are 139 million people in Ethiopia and 116 million in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: about 20% more people than the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo's population is 9.5 times what it was in 1950; Ethiopia's population is 7.9 times what it was in 1950.

Looking ahead: the Democratic Republic of the Congo's population is still growing in 2100, and Ethiopia's population is still growing in 2100. The UN expects the Democratic Republic of the Congo to have more people than Ethiopia from 2056. In 2100: 431 million in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 367 million in Ethiopia (UN projection, medium).

Show the numbers

Year	Democratic Republic of the Congo: people	Ethiopia: people	Democratic Republic of the Congo: half older than	Ethiopia: half older than	Democratic Republic of the Congo: children per woman	Ethiopia: children per woman	Democratic Republic of the Congo: life expectancy	Ethiopia: life expectancy
1950	12.2943 million	17.6704 million	18.1	18.0	5.97	6.43	38.2	35.5
1960	15.2648 million	21.3767 million	18.3	18.5	6.11	6.51	40.8	39.6
1970	20.1374 million	27.8291 million	18.3	18.0	6.33	6.78	43.3	42.1
1980	26.7111 million	34.4285 million	17.8	16.7	6.50	7.29	45.5	42.8
1990	36.6841 million	47.6097 million	17.7	16.8	6.65	7.20	48.5	45.1
2000	50.5074 million	67.4115 million	17.1	16.1	6.70	6.65	51.9	50.9
2010	68.5630 million	90.5385 million	16.8	16.8	6.59	5.28	56.4	59.7
2023	105.790 million	128.692 million	16.8	19.7	6.05	3.99	61.9	67.3
2030*	131.532 million	152.855 million	17.2	21.2	5.42	3.43	63.0	69.2
2040*	172.596 million	188.451 million	18.8	23.1	4.38	2.90	64.5	71.4
2050*	218.246 million	225.022 million	21.0	25.6	3.66	2.55	66.0	73.3
2060*	266.679 million	260.708 million	23.3	28.2	3.14	2.32	67.2	75.1
2070*	314.382 million	293.791 million	25.6	30.6	2.77	2.15	68.4	76.9
2080*	358.921 million	323.239 million	28.1	33.1	2.50	2.03	69.6	78.5
2090*	398.481 million	347.651 million	30.6	35.4	2.30	1.94	70.7	80.1
2100*	430.709 million	367.290 million	32.8	37.6	2.16	1.88	71.9	81.6

* UN projection, medium variant. People at mid-year; ages and life expectancy in years.

COD − ETH · 1950–2100 · every age

Which ages each place has more of

Each column is a year and each row an age, from babies at the bottom to 100 at the top. The shade of a cell shows which place has more of its people at that age — the key beside the picture tells you which shade is the Democratic Republic of the Congo and which is Ethiopia, and the in-between shade means the same. Because it compares shares, a small place and a large one can be compared fairly.

236 countries · 1950–2100

Where they sit among all countries

Every country in the world, every year from 1950 to 2100. The grey cloud shows where most countries are; the Democratic Republic of the Congo is drawn in solid blue squares and Ethiopia in open orange squares, so you can see whether each is ahead of the crowd, behind it or in the middle.

More comparisons

Keep exploring

Each place on its own: Democratic Republic of the Congo · Ethiopia. Or pick any two places with the boxes at the top of this page.

Other comparisons

Apparatus

Sources and method

Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia are drawn here from one source and one release: the UN Population Division's World Population Prospects 2024, counted through 2023 and projected on its medium variant after that. Two places read off the same tables can be set against each other; two read off different tables cannot.

The working behind the median age, the rounding in the “100 people” pictures and the reason the regions are kept out of the all-country views are all set out in the method.

250 comparisons have a page of their own; any other two places can be compared from the boxes at the top.

Sources: UN WPP 2024 · flag-icons. Every source, its licence and how to cite it →

Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries