Sri Lanka drops to 133rd in world happiness ranking

Sri Lanka has dropped five places to the 133rd spot in the rankings in the 2025 edition of the World Happiness Report.

Published on Thursday by the Wellbeing Research Centre at the University of Oxford in partnership with Gallup and the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, the report evaluates various factors, including health, wealth, freedom, generosity, and freedom from corruption, to measure overall happiness across societies based on self-reported assessments from 147 countries.

Finland once again tops the World Happiness Report’s rankings while the United States — at No. 24 — earned its lowest ranking yet in the 2025 report. 

Sri Lanka, which ranked 128th in last year’s report, has dropped down to the 133rd place in the 13th edition of the annual report, released to mark the United Nations International Day of Happiness on March 20.

According to the report, Sri Lanka has an Average Life Evaluation of 3.891 (out of 10) and is only ranked above countries such as Bangladesh, Egypt, Yemen, Zimbabwe, Lebanon, Seirra Leone and Afghanistan. 

Finland, the world’s happiest country, has managed to keep its No. 1 ranking for eight years running. 

The US fell to its lowest-ever ranking in the 2025 edition of the World Happiness Report amid rising social isolation and political polarization.

Finland continued in the top spot this year, followed by Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Costa Rica, Norway, Israel, Luxembourg, and Mexico.

At the bottom of the index, Afghanistan ranked the lowest, followed by Sierra Leone, Lebanon, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Yemen, Comoros and Lesotho.

The United States ranked 24th, one spot lower than last year, continuing its downward trajectory from a high of 11th place in 2012, when the survey began.

The report draws on Gallup World Poll data from people in more than 140 countries. Countries are ranked on happiness based on their average life evaluations over the three preceding years, in this case 2022 to 2024. 

The report is a partnership of Gallup, the Oxford Wellbeing Research Centre, the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network and an editorial board.

The survey asks each participant to score their life as a whole and rankings are based on those life evaluations. The report then looks at six key variables to help explain life evaluations: GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom, generosity and perceptions of corruption.

--With Agencies Inputs

World’s 20 happiest countries in 2025

1. Finland

2. Denmark

3. Iceland

4. Sweden

5. Netherlands

6. Costa Rica

7. Norway

8. Israel

9. Luxembourg

10. Mexico

11. Australia

12. New Zealand

13. Switzerland

14. Belgium

15. Ireland

16. Lithuania

17. Austria

18. Canada

19. Slovenia

20. Czech Republic

At the bottom of the list

Afghanistan (No. 147) is once again last on the list. Sierra Leone (No. 146), Lebanon (No. 145), Malawi (No. 144) and Zimbabwe (No. 143) make up the rest of the bottom five for happiness.