The Global Religious Landscape June 2012 | Page 24

23
GLOBAL RELIGIOUS LANDSCAPE

The countries with the largest number of Muslims are home to fully two-thirds (66 ) of all
Muslims. The largest share lives in Indonesia (
), followed by India (
), Pakistan (
),
angladesh ( ), Nigeria ( ), Egypt ( ), Iran ( ), Turkey ( ), Algeria ( ) and Morocco (

).

Muslims make up a majority of the population in countries. Nearly three-quarters of all Muslims
(
) live in these countries. Although Muslims are a minority in India (
of the total population),
India nonetheless has one of the largest Muslim populations in the world (in raw numbers).

Median Age
Globally, Muslims are younger (median age of ) than the overall global population (median age
of ). Among the ve regions for which data are available, Muslims are youngest in sub-Saharan
Africa (median age of ), followed by the Middle East and North Africa ( ), Asia and the Paci c
( ), North America ( 6) and Europe ( ).
Muslims are younger than the general population in each of the major regions for which
data are available: North America (Muslims 6 years; general population
years),
Europe ( vs.
), Asia and the Pacific ( vs. ), sub-Saharan Africa ( vs. ) and
the Middle East and North Africa ( vs. ).

Regional Median Ages of Muslims Compared with Overall Median Ages, 2010
50 years
Muslim median age in region
Regional median age

40

40

37
32
29

30

23
20

17

24

26

24

Muslim
median age
23 years

18

10

0
Sub-Saharan
Africa

Middle EastNorth Africa

AsiaPacific

North
America

Europe

Regions are ordered by median age of Muslims from youngest to oldest.
Median age is not presented when reliable age structure data are unavailable.

9 India and Pakistan have Muslim populations of roughly similar size, and it is not entirely clear which is larger. The Pew Forum previously estimated that
Pakistan had the world’s second-largest Muslim population and India had the third-largest; see the Pew Forum’s January 2011 report “The Future of the
Global Muslim Population” and October 2009 report “Mapping the Global Muslim Population.” The difference between the rankings in this report and the
previous reports is primarily due to a downward revision by the United Nations Population Division of its estimate of the size of Pakistan’s total population
and an upward revision of the U.N. estimate of India’s total population. For more details, see the discussion in the Methodology.

MUSLIMS