Latin America & Caribbean: Population living in slums (% of urban population)

Key figures

Since 2000 it is down 12.97 percentage points from 31.9% in 2000. The World Bank has no value for 13 of the years in between; the chart leaves those gaps open rather than joining across them.

What this measures

Population living in slums is the proportion of the urban population living in slum households. A slum household is defined as a group of individuals living under the same roof lacking one or more of the following conditions: access to improved water, access to improved sanitation, sufficient living area, housing durability, and security of tenure, as adopted in the Millennium Development Goal Target 7.D. The successor, the Sustainable Development Goal 11.1.1, considers inadequate housing (housing affordability) to complement the above definition of slums/informal settlements.

Regional and income-group figures are computed by the World Bank as a weighted average.

All 10 values

Population living in slums (% of urban population) in nearby economies

• Djibouti — 48.69% (2022)
• Egypt, Arab Rep. — 3.84% (2022)
• Iran, Islamic Rep. — 44.69% (2022)
• Iraq — 49.34% (2022)
• Kuwait — 0% (2022)
• Lebanon — 4.53% (2022)
• Libya — 16.58% (2022)
• Malta — 0.04% (2022)
• Morocco — 10.85% (2022)
• Oman

More environment data for Latin America & Caribbean

• Population in the largest city (% of urban population) — 23.78% (2025)
• Population in urban agglomerations of more than 1 million (% of total population) — 39.68% (2025)
• Rural population — 123.28 million (2025)
• Rural population (% of total population) — 18.49% (2025)
• Urban population — 543.31 million (2025)
• Urban population (% of total population) — 81.51% (2025)
• Aquaculture production (metric tons) — 4.46 million (2024)
• Capture fisheries production (metric tons) — 14.24 million (2024)

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Questions people ask

What is Latin America & Caribbean's population living in slums (% of urban population)?

18.92% in 2022, according to the World Bank (World Development Indicators).

How has it changed since 2000?

It is down 12.97 percentage points from 31.9% in 2000. The highest value was 31.9% in 2000 and the lowest 17.75% in 2016.

Where does this data come from?

The World Bank's World Development Indicators, licensed CC BY 4.0. Original source: Urban Indicators Database, UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), uri: https://data.unhabitat.org/.

Source

World Bank, World Development Indicators, indicator EN.POP.SLUM.UR.ZS, licensed CC BY 4.0. Original source: Urban Indicators Database, UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), uri: https://data.unhabitat.org/ Figures are fetched from the World Bank API and refreshed monthly; see the series on data.worldbank.org. The full definition and method are in the World Bank's metadata glossary. Comparisons use the same World Bank release.

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