Disclaimer: data sources used rank freedoms at a 1-2 year lag, so recent political developments are not captured. I also missed 2024 - got busy with other projects.
The State of World Liberty Index was a combination of indices compiled originally by Nick Wilson in 2006, and I’ve updated the index semi-annually since 2012. My methodology is similar to the original with the following exceptions: I use only the civil liberties portion of Freedom House, economy liberty (Fraser/Heritage) is weighted evenly with social liberty, and the Reporters without Borders Press Freedom Score is of equal weight to each of the Freedom House Civil Liberties sub-components. All changes are done with the purpose of creating the most accurate relative ranking of countries by the degree of liberty (economic and social) enjoyed by the average individual within the state or territory. Note, the ranking is not reflective of, nor directly includes, political or electoral rights. This is largely why it differs from Freedom House. CATO’s Human Freedom Index measures a similar concept to that here, but attempts to measure freedom objectively rather than relatively and has different weights and data sources. Where data is available, territories or colonies (e.g. Hong Kong) are included.
Also compiled is a ranking on the Conservative-Progressive spectrum, where conservative is more economic liberty relative to social liberty, and progressive is more social liberty relative to economic liberty. This added dimension allows for grouping states by both liberty and ideology, such as Moderate Free (Switzerland) and Moderate Tyranny (North Korea), Progressive Free (Argentina) and Progressive Tyranny (Zimbabwe), and Conservative Free (Singapore) and Conservative Tyranny (Turkmenistan).
A complete ranking, along with past years, is available here: [LINK]
2025 Liberty by Quintile. Colors represent countries grouped by quintiles in order of blue (top 20%), green (20-40%), yellow (40-60%), orange (60-80%), and red (80-100%).
2025 Most Free Countries:
1. Switzerland
2. New Zealand
2. Ireland
4. Denmark
4. Luxembourg
4. Finland
4. Norway
8. Netherlands
8. Sweden
10. Canada
10. Estonia
2025 Most Oppressive Countries:
1. North Korea
2. Syria
3. Venezuela
4. Cuba
4. Sudan
6. Libya
6. Yemen
6. Eritrea
9. Myanmar
9. Iran
2025 Five Year Change in Liberty. Blue is an increase in rank by >20 and green >10. Orange is a fall in rank of >10 and red >20 since 2019.
2025 Greatest 5 Year Increase:
1. Bahrain
2. Mauritania
3. Nepal
4. Saudi Arabia
4. Brunei
4. Dominican Republic
7. Montenegro
8. Djibouti
9. Seychelles
10. Uzbekistan
10. Vietnam
10. Bolivia
10. Gambia
2025 Greatest 5 Year Decrease:
1. Burkina Faso
2. Bahamas
3. Lebanon
3. Ukraine
5. Hong Kong
6. Nicaragua
7. Tunisia
7. Kyrygz Republic
7. Mynamar
10. Sri Lanka
10. Belarus
2025 Conservative-Progressive Ranking. Grouped by quintile, red is very conservative, pink is conservative, yellow is moderate, light blue is progressive, and blue is very progressive.
The below graphs the amount of liberty enjoyed by the average citizen of a state (x-axis) by the balance of whether the state more heavily regulates economic or social behaviors (y-axis).
2025 Most Conservative:
1. Saudi Arabia
1. United Arab Emirates
3. Singapore
4. Hong Kong
5. Bahrain
5. Turkmenistan
7. Tajikistan
8. Azerbaijan
8. Uzbekistan
10. Vietnam
10. Belarus
2025 Most Progressive:
1. Argentina
2. Suriname
3. Dominica
4. Belize
5. Timor-Leste
6. Ghana
7. St. Vincent and the Grenadines
7. Guyana
7. Slovenia
7. Barbados