WEF’s Global Gender Gap Report 2025 : India Slips to 131st; Iceland Topped

On June 12, 2025, Cologny (Switzerland) based World Economic Forum (WEF) released 19th edition of the annual report titled “Global Gender Gap Report ”. India ranked 131st out of 148 countries, falling two positions from the previous year with a score of 0.644.

• Iceland has topped the rankings for the 16th time with a score of 0.926, followed by Finland(0.879), Norway(0.863), United Kingdom (UK)(0.838) and New Zealand(0.827).

About Global Gender Gap Report:

i.The Global Gender Gap Report has been released annually by the WEF since 2006.

ii.The index measures scores on a 0-100 scale and scores can be interpreted as the distance covered towards parity (the percentage of the gender gap that has been closed).

• A parity score of 1 indicates full parity. A gender gap is the distance from full parity.

iii.The Index evaluates gender equality across four main dimensions: Economic Participation and Opportunity; Educational Attainment; Health and Survival; and Political Empowerment.

ivEach subindex generates a score ranging from 0 to 1, where higher scores signify better gender equality.

• The overall index monitors countries’ progress in narrowing gender gaps over time, relying solely on outcome-based metrics rather than input or contextual factors.

Highlights of Global Gender Gap Report 2025:

i.The 2025 Index, benchmarks gender parity across 148 economies, providing a basis for the analysis for gender parity developments across two-thirds of the world’s economies.

ii.The 2025 Global Gender Gap Index shows that while no country has achieved full gender parity, each of the top 10 ranked economies have closed at least 80% of their gender gaps.

iii.Globally, the gender gap has narrowed to 68.8%, marking the quickest improvement since the pandemic, but if current trends continue, it will take another 123 years to achieve full gender equality.

Global Performance On 4 Dimensions of Gender Parity:

i.Economic Participation and Opportunity : In 2025, the global gender gap in this area has closed by 60.7%, marking a 0.4% point improvement from the previous year.

ii.Educational Attainment: This dimension has achieved a 94.9% closure of the gender gap globally.

iii.Health and Survival: This dimension has closed 96.0% of the gender gap.iv.Political Empowerment: Despite improvements, it remains the most significant area of disparity, with a 23.2% closure of the gender gap, up from 22.5% in 2024.

Top 5 Countries on Global Gender Gap Index 2025:

Note: Afghanistan(148) ranked last with a parity score of 0.000, indicating it has yet to close any gender gap.

2025 Global Gender Gap Performance: Region Wise

i.The report groups the economies into 8 regions such as Europe, North America, Latin America and the Caribbean, Central Asia, Eastern Asia and the Pacific, Sub-Saharan Africa, Southern Asia, Middle East and Northern Africa.

ii.European Economies dominate the top 10, occupying 8 of the spots. Among them Iceland, Finland, Norway and Sweden have consistently ranked in the top 10 in every edition since 2006.

iii.North America leads the 2025 regional gender gap ranking, closing 75.8% of its gap in 2025.

iv.Europe shows a gender parity score of 75.1%, ranking 2nd and Latin America and the Caribbean with a score of 74.5%, Central Asia (69.8%), Eastern Asia and the Pacific (69.4%), Sub-Saharan Africa (68%), Southern Asia (64.6%), Middle East and Northern Africa (61.7%).

South Asia:

In 2025, Southern Asia ranked 7th, with a gender gap score of 64.6%, the second lowest economy of the eight regions.

Top 7 countries in South Asia:

Sub Index Analysis for India:

i.India scored 40.7%, with an increase of 9 basis points(bps) Economic Participation and Opportunity, higher compared to the score of 39.8% in 2024.

• The score of Labour Force Participation remained the same (45.9%) as 2024, which is the highest achieved by India.
• The indicator, Estimated Earned Income has increased from 28.6% to 29.9%, which positively impacts the subindex score.However, the economy’s overall performance shows an absolute improvement of +0.3 points.

ii.India has showed slight improvement in Educational Attainment, scoring 97.1% and ranked 110th as compared to the score of 96.4% in 2024.

• The share of females in the literacy and tertiary education enrolment has witnessed a significant shift.
• India ranks 1st in terms of the enrolment in secondary education, and the enrolment of tertiary education, which ranked 105th in 2024.
• India ranks 91st in primary education enrolment and ranks 114th in the literacy rate globally.

iii.In the Health and Wealth Index, India has improved one place higher and is ranked 143rd in 2025 with the closure of 95.4% in gender parity, with an improvement of 3 bps as compared to 95.1% in 2024.

• India has recorded higher in the indicator sex ratio at birth with 93% in gender parity and ranked 139th.
• Healthy life expectancy has improved, despite the overall reduction in men and women’s life expectancy.

iv.India has showed decline in the Political Empowerment of women with 24.5% closure and 69th rank.

• The female representation in parliament has declined from 14.7% to 13.8% with the score of 16% in 2025, lowering the indicator score for the second year in a row below 2023 levels.
• The share of women in ministerial roles has declined from 6.5% to 5.6%, moving the indicator score (5.9%) further away this year from its highest level (30% in 2019)

India’s Ranks in Sub Index:

About World Economic Forum (WEF):
President – Borge Brende
Headquarters – Cologny, Switzerland
Established – 1971