Every country as a forest. Each grove is one generation, the people born in the same year, and it ages with them.
Population and aging
Japan’s share aged 65 and over rises from 5.7% in 1960 to 29.8% in 2024 and a projected 37.5% in 2050. China’s corresponding shares are 14.7% in 2024 and a projected 30.9% in 2050. Nigeria has a younger age structure, with 3.0% aged 65 and over in 2024.
The world’s population aged 65 and over first exceeds the number under five in 2019 in this dataset. A population pyramid describes the same distribution by age; the forest groups people born in the same year into a grove. These figures combine sexes rather than splitting them into male and female bars.
Population Forest covers 237 countries and areas from 1950 to 2100 using UN World Population Prospects 2024. Years through 2023 are estimates; 2024 onward follows the Medium projection. Country forests have their own tree scales, while the world map shares a common scale. Percentages are rounded.
How to read the forest
A grove sprouts in the year its people are born and stays in its place as they grow older. Leaf colour follows their age: pale green for the youngest, deep summer green through working life, gold from 65 and maple red from 80. Older trees are broader, younger ones smaller.
When a generation gets smaller, mostly through deaths and partly through people moving abroad, its grove draws in from the edge. The trees sink into the ground and leave wildflowers, later open meadow where new groves can grow. When people move into the country, trees are transplanted into their generation’s grove.
In a country’s forest one tree stands for a fixed number of people, shown at the foot of the age panel, so the forest grows and shrinks with the population. Each country has its own scale, set so that every forest has about the same number of trees in its most populous year.
On the world map every country shares one scale: a tree for every million people, or every two million on phones. Each country’s trees stand inside its borders, gathered around its cities, so the forest is thickest where people live. Leaf colours follow that country’s ages in that year.
The age panel uses the usual demographic groups: children (0–14), working age (15–64) and older people (65+).
Music
Music is off until you press the speaker button beside Play (or the M key). It is composed as you listen, from the numbers in the age panel. A young population sounds like spring, light and lively; an older one like a mild autumn afternoon, slower and warmer. Your choice is remembered in this browser.
Data and credits
Population figures: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2024). World Population Prospects 2024, population by single age, Medium variant. Licensed under CC BY 3.0 IGO.
Figures up to 2023 are estimates. From 2024 on they are projections, drawn dashed on the timeline.
Population Forest turns these figures into trees and rounds the percentages. It is an independent project, not affiliated with or endorsed by the United Nations.
Borders and cities: Natural Earth (public domain). Borders and place names are for orientation only and imply no position on the legal status of any country or territory.
World Population ProspectsCC BY 3.0 IGONatural Earththree.js · MIT
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Population Forest is a studio piece by LifeVen. We design and build websites, apps and interactive experiences like this one.