Demographics & population — Nigeria
Population size, age structure, migration, ethnicity, language, education, and health indicators.
Profile updated 2026-06-02
⚡ Demographics & population at a glance
Population size, age structure, migration, ethnicity, language, education, and health indicators. Key figure for Nigeria: 236,747,130
Immigration rules and fees change frequently — confirm current requirements on official government or embassy websites.
Population overview
- Population
236,747,130
- Population Growth Rate
2.52%
- Population Distribution
largest population of any African nation; significant population clusters are scattered throughout the country, with the highest density areas being in the south and southwest
- Urban Population
- urban population: 54.3%
- of total population rate of urbanization: 3.92% annual rate of change
- Population in Major Urban Areas
15.946 million Lagos, 4.348 million Kano, 3.875 million Ibadan, 3.840 million ABUJA (capital), 3.480 million Port Harcourt, 1.905 million Benin City
- Population: Male/Female
- male: 119,514,449
- female: 117,232,681
Age & family
- Age Structure
- years: 40.4% (male 48,856,606/female 46,770,810) 15-64
- years: 56.2% (male 66,897,900/female 66,187,584) 65
- years and over: 3.4% (male 3,759,943/female 4,274,287)
- Median Age
- total: 19.3
- years male: 19.1
- years female: 19.6 years
- Birth Rate - births/1,000 population
34
- Death Rate - deaths/1,000 population
8.4
- Total Fertility Rate - children born/woman
4.52
- Gross reproduction rate
2
- Child Marriage
- women married by age 15: 12.3%
- women married by age 18: 30.3%
- men married by age 18: 1.6%
- note: due to prolonged insecurity concerns, some parts of states, including Borno state, were not sampled
- Contraceptive Prevalance Rate - female 12-49
16.6%
- Contraceptive Prevalence Rate - female 12-49
16.6%
- Currently married women (ages 15-49)
66.2%
- Mean Age for Mother's First Birth (age 25-49)
20.4
- Mother's mean age at first birth
20.4
- Sex Ratio at Birth - male/female
- at birth: 1.06
- male(s)/female 0-14 years: 1.04
- male(s)/female 15-64 years: 1.01
- male(s)/female 65 years and over: 0.88
- male(s)/female total population: 1.02 male(s)/female
Migration
- Net Migration Rate - migrant(s)/1,000 population
-0.2
- Demographic profile
Nigeria’s population is projected to grow from more than 186 million people in 2016 to 392 million in 2050, becoming the world’s fourth most populous country.
Nigeria’s sustained high population growth rate will continue for the foreseeable future because of population momentum and its high birth rate.
Abuja has not successfully implemented family planning programs to reduce and space births because of a lack of political will, government financing, and the availability and affordability of services and products, as well as a cultural preference for large families.
Increased educational attainment, especially among women, and improvements in health care are needed to encourage and to better enable parents to opt for smaller families.
Nigeria needs to harness the potential of its burgeoning youth population in order to boost economic development, reduce widespread poverty, and channel large numbers of unemployed youth into productive activities and away from ongoing religious and ethnic violence.
While most movement of Nigerians is internal, significant emigration regionally and to the West provides an outlet for Nigerians looking for economic opportunities, seeking asylum, and increasingly pursuing higher education.
Immigration largely of West Africans continues to be insufficient to offset emigration and the loss of highly skilled workers.
Nigeria also is a major source, transit, and destination country for forced labor and sex trafficking.
Ethnicity & language
- Ethnic Groups
Hausa 30%, Yoruba 15.5%, Igbo (Ibo) 15.2%, Fulani 6%, Tiv 2.4%, Kanuri/Beriberi 2.4%, Ibibio 1.8%, Ijaw/Izon 1.8%, other 24.9%
- Language Note
English (official), Hausa, Yoruba, Igbo (Ibo), Fulani, over 500 additional indigenous languages
- Nationality Noun
- Nigerian(s) adjective: Nigerian
Education
- Literacy - total population
62%
- Literacy - male
71.3%
- Literacy - female
52.7%
- Literacy Definition
age 15 and over can read and write
- Education Expenditures - percent of GDP
0.5%
Health & living conditions
- Life Expectancy at Birth
- total population: 62.2
- years male: 60.4
- years female: 64.2 years
- Infant Mortality Rate
- total: 53.7 deaths/1,000
- live births male: 58.9 deaths/1,000
- live births female: 48.2 deaths/1,000 live births
- Infant Mortality Rate - total deaths/1,000 live births
- total: 53.7 deaths/1,000
- live births male: 58.9 deaths/1,000
- live births female: 48.2 deaths/1,000 live births
- Maternal Mortality Rate - deaths/100,000 live births
1,047
- Physicians Density - physicians/1,000 population
.38
- Hospital Bed Density - beds/1,000 population
.53
- Health Expenditures - percent of GDP
3.4%
- Major Infectious Diseases - degree of risk
- very high food or waterborne diseases: bacterial and protozoal diarrhea, hepatitis A,
- and typhoid fever vectorborne diseases: malaria, dengue fever,
- rabies respiratory diseases: menin
- Lassa fever note 1: on 4 May 2022, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a Travel Health Notice for a Yellow Fever outbreak in Nigeria; a large, ongoing outbreak of yellow fever in Nigeria began in September 2017; the outbreak is now spread throughout the country with the Nigerian Ministry of Health reporting cases of the disease in multiple states (Bauchi, Benue, Delta, Ebonyi, and Enugu); the CDC recommends travelers going to Nigeria should receive vaccination against yellow fever at least 10 days before travel and should take steps to prevent mosquito bites while there; those never vaccinated against yellow fe
- ver should avoid travel to Nigeria during the outbreak note 2: on 31 August 2023, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a Travel Alert for polio in Africa; Nigeria is currently considered a high risk to travelers for circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses (cVDPV); vaccine-derived poliovirus (VDPV) is a strain of the weakened poliovirus that was initially included in oral polio vaccine (OPV) and that has changed over time and behaves more like the wild or naturally occurring virus; this means it can be spread more easily to people who are unvaccinated against polio and who come in contact with the stool or respiratory secretions, such as from a sneeze, of an “infected” person who received oral polio vaccine; the CDC recommends that before any international travel, anyone unvaccinated, incompletely vaccinated, or with an unknown polio vaccination status should complete the routine polio vaccine series; before travel to any high-risk destination, the CDC recommends that adults who previously completed the full, routine polio vaccine series receive a single,
- lifetime booster dose of polio vaccine note 3: on 20 September 2023, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated a Travel Health Alert for a diphtheria outbreak in several states in Nigeria; vaccination against diphtheria is essential to protect against disease; if you are traveling to an affected area, you should be up to date with your diphtheria vaccines; before travel, discuss the need for a booster dose with your healthcare professional; diphtheria is a serious infection caused by strains of Corynebacterium diphtheriae bacteria that make a toxin from which people get very sick; diphtheria bacteria spread from person to person through respiratory droplets like from coughing or sneezing; people can also get sick from touchi
- ng open sores or ulcers of people sick with diphtheria note 1: The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) is reporting yellow fever outbreaks in multiple states (Bauchi, Benue, Delta, Ebonyi, and Enugu). Unless vaccinated, travelers should not visit these areas. Yellow fever is caused by a virus transmitted through bites of infected mosquitoes. Travelers to Nigeria should take steps to prevent yellow fever by getting vaccinated at least 10 days bef
- ore travel and taking steps to prevent mosquito bites. note 3: There is an outbreak of diphtheria in several states in Nigeria. Vaccination against diphtheria is essential to protect against disease. If you are traveling to an affected area, you should be up to date with your diphtheria vaccines.
- Obesity - adult prevalence rate
8.9%
- Tobacco Use
- total: 3.7%
- male: 6.9%
- female: 0.5%
- Alcohol consumption per capita
- total: 4.49
- liters of pure alcohol beer: 0.73
- liters of pure alcohol wine: 0.09
- liters of pure alcohol spirits: 0.4
- liters of pure alcohol other alcohols: 3.27 liters of pure alcohol
- Drinking Water Source - percent of urban population improved
- urban: 95.3%
- of population rural: 68.8%
- of population total: 82.6%
- urban: 4.7%
- of population rural: 31.2%
- of population total: 17.4% of population
- Sanitation Facility Access - percent of urban population improved
- urban: 81.6%
- of population rural: 41.4%
- of population total: 62.3%
- urban: 18.4%
- of population rural: 58.6%
- of population total: 37.7% of population
- Underweight - percent of children under five years
18.4%