Take Our Survey and Help Shape What Comes Next Rapid urban growth is transforming cities across the Global South. But in many places, official property and land-use records are outdated, or do not exist at all. This makes it difficult for authorities to plan new roads, schools, utilities or emergency services. New WorldPop research led […]
Help for planners as cities grow in the Global South Read More »
WorldPop is partnering with the International Data Alliance for Children on the Move (IDAC) to host a webinar on February 19 exploring how AI can bridge critical demographic gaps for children on the move. This session highlights the necessity of accurate and contemporary data to ensure vulnerable populations are visible in humanitarian decision-making. Professor Andy
WorldPop/IDAC Webinar: Demographic Gaps for Children on the Move Read More »
How do you use WorldPop open data – and how would you like to use it in the future? We’d love to hear from you. We’re running an anonymous survey to better understand how people use (or would like to use) our data. The survey takes just a few minutes to complete and is completely
Help Shape the Future of WorldPop Open Data Read More »
An international team of researchers, including experts from the WorldPop group at the University of Southampton, has challenged recent claims that gridded global population maps systematically undercount rural communities. In a comprehensive response to a study published in Nature Communications, the team argues that allegations of a 50% undercount are based on a flawed research design that
Global Population Data Experts Refute Claims of Systematic Rural Underrepresentation Read More »
An international research team led by Dr Paolo Andrich, a visiting researcher at WorldPop based at the University of Oxford, has developed a novel statistical framework to turn anonymised, biased social media data into reliable population estimates. This approach provides a timely and contemporary alternative to traditional censuses, which are often static and struggle to
Transforming Social Media Signals into Accurate Population Maps for Crisis Response Read More »
Last week, the WorldPop senior team met with their counterparts at DHIS2 at their headquarters in the University of Oslo. The conversations marked an important moment to step back from day-to-day technical work and focus on the bigger picture: how population data and digital administrative systems can work together to support better public services worldwide.
Strengthening Data Systems Together: WorldPop Meets the DHIS2 Team in Oslo Read More »
We’re thrilled to celebrate a major milestone in our mission to ensure that everyone, everywhere is counted in decision-making. Since 2019, our open spatial demographic datasets have reached over 1 million downloads from our own site – adding to the hundreds of thousands more from our data hosting partners including HDX, ESRI’s Living Atlas, and
Celebrating a Milestone: 1 Million Downloads and Counting Read More »
In late October, WorldPop joined statistical leaders from across the Caribbean at the 50th meeting of the Caribbean Community’s (CARICOM) Standing Committee on Caribbean Statistics in Willemstad, Curaçao. Deputy Director Ian Coady, Senior Enterprise Fellow Dr Natalia Garavito-Tejedor and Senior Programme Coordinator, Kathryn Baxter represented WorldPop at a moment when high-quality, accessible data is becoming
The 2025 Human Planet Forum gathered global experts in population modelling, urban analytics, and Earth observation for three days of scientific progress and growing collaboration. A central theme throughout the meeting was the acceleration of high-resolution, openly accessible global datasets and included a presentation by Professor Andy Tatem of our new, open Global 2 (2015-2030)
Progress in Population and Urban Data: Highlights from the Human Planet Forum 2025 Read More »
This week, WorldPop Director Professor Andy Tatem presented during the Monitoring, projecting and hindcasting of human settlements, infrastructure and population session at the Human Planet Forum 2025, introducing the next generation of WorldPop’s global population datasets: Global 2 (2015–2030). These new datasets represent a major step forward in how the world measures, understands, and anticipates
WorldPop Global 2: A New Era of High-Resolution Population Data Read More »
The WorldPop research programme, based in the School of Geography and Environmental Sciences at the University of Southampton, is a multi-sectoral team of researchers, technicians and project specialists that produces data on population distributions and characteristics at high spatial resolution.
Initiated in October 2013 to combine The AfriPop Project, AsiaPop and AmeriPop projects, we have a diverse portfolio of projects, including large multi-million-pound collaborative projects with partner organisations, commercial data providers and international development organisations.
