Topics
Compare · UN World Population Prospects 2024
Mali and 
North Korea, side by side
In 2026, half of the people in Mali are older than 17. In North Korea, half are older than 38.
UN estimates for mid-2023: Mali 23,769,128 people · North Korea 26,418,204
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.
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.
men women projected
MLI × PRK · 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.
- Children, under 15
- 46
- Aged 15 to 64
- 52
- Aged 65 and over
- 2
- Children, under 15
- 19
- Aged 15 to 64
- 68
- Aged 65 and over
- 13
MLI × PRK · families and lifetimes
Children, and how long lives last
At today's rates, a woman in Mali would have about 5.3 children in her lifetime. In North Korea, about 1.8. Around 2.1 children per woman keeps a population the same size over time, leaving migration aside. A baby born in Mali this year can expect to live about 61 years. In North Korea, about 74.
Children per woman, 2026
Each figure is one child: how many children a woman would have in her lifetime at that year’s rates.
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.
Hatched marks are UN projections (medium variant), not measurements.
MLI × PRK · 1950–2100 · how many
How big, and where they are heading
North Korea has about as many people as Mali: 26.6 million against 25.9 million.
Set each against its own 1950 self and Mali's population is 5.5 times what it was in 1950, North Korea's population is 2.4 times what it was in 1950.
Mali's population is still growing in 2100; North Korea's population is expected to peak in 2032. The UN expects Mali to have more people than North Korea from 2028. In 2100: 79.4 million in Mali, 19.5 million in North Korea (UN projection, medium).
Show the numbers
| Year | Mali: people | North Korea: people | Mali: half older than | North Korea: half older than | Mali: children per woman | North Korea: children per woman | Mali: life expectancy | North Korea: life expectancy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1950 | 4.69691 million | 11.1167 million | 20.5 | 17.3 | 6.87 | 4.99 | 28.7 | 14.2 |
| 1960 | 5.40255 million | 11.7230 million | 19.8 | 19.9 | 7.02 | 3.57 | 30.5 | 55.8 |
| 1970 | 6.27647 million | 15.1728 million | 19.4 | 21.4 | 7.18 | 3.85 | 33.4 | 62.0 |
| 1980 | 7.53051 million | 18.2368 million | 18.0 | 22.4 | 7.37 | 2.84 | 40.3 | 67.2 |
| 1990 | 9.17883 million | 21.1121 million | 16.4 | 25.9 | 7.31 | 2.39 | 46.5 | 70.5 |
| 2000 | 11.5593 million | 23.6659 million | 16.4 | 30.1 | 6.89 | 1.94 | 50.6 | 60.9 |
| 2010 | 15.9452 million | 24.9873 million | 16.3 | 34.0 | 6.58 | 1.89 | 56.0 | 70.3 |
| 2023 | 23.7691 million | 26.4182 million | 16.5 | 37.0 | 5.61 | 1.78 | 60.4 | 73.6 |
| 2030* | 29.0029 million | 26.7849 million | 17.5 | 39.0 | 4.96 | 1.72 | 61.9 | 74.5 |
| 2040* | 37.4136 million | 26.5424 million | 19.2 | 42.1 | 4.05 | 1.69 | 63.8 | 75.7 |
| 2050* | 46.1541 million | 25.7871 million | 21.2 | 43.9 | 3.37 | 1.67 | 65.4 | 77.0 |
| 2060* | 54.7875 million | 24.6827 million | 23.8 | 44.7 | 2.90 | 1.66 | 66.8 | 78.4 |
| 2070* | 62.9195 million | 23.3978 million | 26.4 | 46.6 | 2.58 | 1.66 | 68.0 | 79.8 |
| 2080* | 69.9942 million | 22.1247 million | 29.0 | 48.0 | 2.36 | 1.65 | 69.2 | 81.2 |
| 2090* | 75.5399 million | 20.8217 million | 31.5 | 48.4 | 2.20 | 1.65 | 70.4 | 82.5 |
| 2100* | 79.3541 million | 19.5121 million | 33.8 | 49.6 | 2.08 | 1.64 | 71.5 | 83.8 |
* UN projection, medium variant. People at mid-year; ages and life expectancy in years.
MLI − PRK · 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 Mali and which is North Korea, 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; Mali is drawn in solid blue squares and North Korea 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: Mali · North Korea. Or pick any two places with the boxes at the top of this page.
Apparatus
Sources and method
Every figure for Mali and North Korea is the United Nations Population Division's, from World Population Prospects 2024: counted to 2023, and the medium projection for each year after that. Both places are taken from the same release and the same tables, which is what makes them comparable at all.
How the median age and the “100 people” pictures are worked out, and why the pictures of every country leave the regions out: how the figures here are put together.
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