Compare · UN World Population Prospects 2024

Madagascar and Poland, side by side

Madagascar in 2026: half the people are older than 20. Poland: half are older than 44.

UN estimates for mid-2023: Madagascar 31,195,932 people · Poland 38,762,844

Madagascar 33.5 million people Half are older than 20 3 in 100 are 65 or older

Poland 37.8 million people Half are older than 44 21 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

MDG × POL · 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.

Madagascar

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

Poland

Children, under 15: 14
Aged 15 to 64: 65
Aged 65 and over: 21

MDG × POL · families and lifetimes

Children, and how long lives last

Madagascar is at about 3.8 children for each woman, at this year's rates; Poland is at about 1.3. Around 2.1 children per woman keeps a population the same size over time, leaving migration aside. A baby born in Madagascar this year can expect to live about 64 years. In Poland, about 79.

Children per woman, 2026

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

Madagascar 3.8

Poland 1.3

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.

Madagascar 64 years

Poland 79 years

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

MDG × POL · 1950–2100 · how many

How big, and where they are heading

Poland is the larger of the two, with about 10% more people than Madagascar: 37.8 million to 33.5 million.

Set each against its own 1950 self and Madagascar's population is 8.5 times what it was in 1950, Poland's population is 1.5 times what it was in 1950.

Looking ahead: Madagascar's population is still growing in 2100, and Poland's population peaked in 2023. The UN expects Madagascar to have more people than Poland from 2031. In 2100: 85.3 million in Madagascar, 19.3 million in Poland (UN projection, medium).

Show the numbers

Year	Madagascar: people	Poland: people	Madagascar: half older than	Poland: half older than	Madagascar: children per woman	Poland: children per woman	Madagascar: life expectancy	Poland: life expectancy
1950	3.95607 million	24.7802 million	20.7	25.8	7.43	3.65	39.7	58.3
1960	5.11103 million	29.5760 million	17.8	26.6	7.34	3.00	43.4	67.1
1970	6.67200 million	32.5426 million	16.6	28.3	7.10	2.25	47.9	69.6
1980	9.00603 million	35.5765 million	16.4	29.5	6.84	2.28	50.0	70.5
1990	12.0556 million	38.0555 million	16.8	32.4	6.14	2.06	52.1	70.6
2000	16.5163 million	38.2581 million	17.1	35.3	5.67	1.37	58.0	73.7
2010	22.1833 million	38.0954 million	17.7	37.9	4.90	1.41	62.6	76.3
2023	31.1959 million	38.7628 million	19.9	42.3	3.97	1.30	63.6	78.6
2030*	36.6932 million	37.1985 million	21.1	46.0	3.56	1.33	65.0	79.8
2040*	44.8469 million	35.1795 million	23.0	50.3	3.12	1.37	66.8	81.5
2050*	53.1855 million	32.8141 million	25.2	52.8	2.82	1.40	68.3	83.0
2060*	61.3529 million	30.1392 million	27.4	53.5	2.59	1.42	69.6	84.4
2070*	68.9261 million	27.1036 million	29.4	55.4	2.41	1.45	70.9	85.6
2080*	75.5124 million	24.0377 million	31.5	56.2	2.25	1.46	72.2	86.8
2090*	80.9926 million	21.4526 million	33.4	55.5	2.15	1.47	73.5	87.9
2100*	85.3411 million	19.3298 million	35.2	56.3	2.06	1.49	74.8	89.0

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

MDG − POL · 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 Madagascar and which is Poland, 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; Madagascar is drawn in solid blue squares and Poland 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: Madagascar · Poland. Or pick any two places with the boxes at the top of this page.

Other comparisons

Apparatus

Sources and method

Both sides of this comparison come from the UN Population Division's World Population Prospects 2024 — the same release, the same tables, counted to 2023 and projected beyond it on the medium variant. That shared origin is what a comparison rests on.

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.

This is one of 250 pairs with a page. The boxes at the top will take any other two places you want to see side by side.

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

Verified 2026-09-30 · 73 canaries