Global GDP over the long run

What you should know about this indicator
- Gross domestic product (GDP) is a measure of the total value added from the production of goods and services in a country or region each year.
- This global GDP indicator provides information on global economic growth and income levels in the very long run. Estimates are available as far back as 1 CE.
- This data is adjusted for inflation and for differences in living costs between countries.
- This data is expressed in international-$ at 2021 prices, combining data from the Maddison Database, Maddison Project Database, and World Bank.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are international-$ and why are they used to measure incomes?
Much of the economic data we use to understand the world — for instance, on the goods and services bought or produced by households, firms and governments, or the incomes they receive — is initially recorded in terms of the units in which these transactions took place. That means this data starts out being expressed in a variety of local currencies — such as rupees, US dollars, or yuan, etc. — and without adjusting for inflation over time. This is known as being in “current prices”, or in “nominal” terms.
Sources and processing
This data is based on the following sources
How we process data at Our World in Data
All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.
At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.
Notes on our processing step for this indicator
The data presented here from 1990 onwards is from the World Bank. We constructed the data before 1990 using the 1990 World Bank observation and applying the growth rates implied by the Maddison Project Database. Similarly, we built the data before 1820 using the adjusted 1820 estimate calculated by the previous method and applying the growth rates implied by the Maddison Database. These steps are necessary because World Bank data adjusted for inflation and the cost of living between countries is only available from 1990 onwards and also because the three datasets estimate GDP with different prices.
We rounded the adjusted results before 1990 to address uncertainty in the underlying data. We rounded GDP data to the nearest million, and GDP to the nearest hundred.
Reuse this work
- All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
- All data, visualizations, and code produced by Our World in Data are completely open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have the permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited.
Citations
How to cite this page
To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:
“Data Page: Global GDP over the long run”, part of the following publication: Max Roser, Pablo Arriagada, Joe Hasell, Hannah Ritchie and Esteban Ortiz-Ospina (2023) - “Economic Growth”. Data adapted from Data compiled from multiple sources by World Bank, Bolt and van Zanden, Angus Maddison. Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/global-gdp-over-the-long-run [online resource]
How to cite this data
In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:
Data compiled from multiple sources by World Bank (2025); Bolt and van Zanden - Maddison Project Database 2023; Maddison Database 2010 – with major processing by Our World in Data
Full citation
Data compiled from multiple sources by World Bank (2025); Bolt and van Zanden - Maddison Project Database 2023; Maddison Database 2010 – with major processing by Our World in Data. “Global GDP over the long run – Maddison Database, Maddison Project Database, World Bank – In constant international-$. Historical data” [dataset]. Data compiled from multiple sources by World Bank, “World Development Indicators”; Bolt and van Zanden, “Maddison Project Database 2023”; Angus Maddison, “Maddison Database 2010” [original data]. Retrieved February 13, 2025 from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/global-gdp-over-the-long-run