WORLD FOREST AREA / 2023
Where the world
keeps its green.
Forest area across 213 countries and territories, and how it has changed since 1992.
ALL THE WORLD’S FOREST, SPLIT BY COUNTRY
LARGEST LOSSES SINCE 2000
LARGEST GAINS SINCE 2000
Forest share of land
03 / THE PATTERN
A world of different canopies.
Each card adds up every country’s forest and land, so larger countries count for more. The cards follow the year above.
04 / COUNTRY INDEX
Explore the country rankings.
Sort by forest share, forest area or change since 2000. The table follows the region filter and the year above.
| # | Country or territory | Region | 2023 forest share | 2023 forest area | Change 2000–2023 | 1992–2023 |
|---|
READING THE DATA
What the map measures.
The figures come from the World Bank’s forest series, sourced from FAOSTAT: forest share of land, forest area in km² and land area, for every year from 1992 to 2023. The change measure compares a year with 2000 in percentage points. It is not a measure of annual tree loss, forest quality, or biodiversity.
The UN’s forest assessments report 1990, 2000, 2010 and each year from 2015; the years in between are straight-line estimates. The world series, Russia and other former Soviet and Yugoslav states start in 1992. Regions add up every country’s forest and land, so larger countries count for more.
The map uses generalized country boundaries. Places too small for them are dots at their capitals. Places without a figure for the chosen year are hatched and show as “no comparison” in the change measure.