UNAIDS published its estimates for 2025 this year, and the World Health Organization republishes them country by country. They show 41.0 million people living with HIV worldwide, 1.2 million new infections and 570,000 HIV-related deaths. We turned five of the indicators into rankings: people living with HIV, new infections, deaths, the adult HIV rate and the infection rate.
South Africa tops four of the five lists
South Africa had 7.6 million people living with HIV, 18.5% of the world total, 130,000 new infections (10.8% of all new infections) and 42,000 deaths. It also has the highest infection rate, 2.4 per 1,000 uninfected people. India is second for people living with HIV, with 2.6 million, and Mozambique third with 2.5 million.
Fewer infections and deaths, more people living with HIV
Since 2010 new infections have fallen 42.9% and deaths 56.2%, yet the number of people living with HIV has grown 26.2%, because treatment lets people live for decades with the virus. The falls are not everywhere. New infections rose in Brazil, from 48,000 to 69,000, in Pakistan, from 14,000 to 44,000, and in the Philippines, from 4,600 to 34,000.
The highest rates are in southern Africa
In Eswatini 22.4% of adults aged 15 to 49 live with HIV, in Lesotho 16.3% and in South Africa 15.9%, against 0.7% worldwide. Eswatini's rate of new infections fell from 16.6 to 1.9 per 1,000 uninfected people, the biggest drop on the list. Fiji is the outlier: its adult HIV rate rose from 0.1% in 2010 to 1.6%.
Summary
| Chart | Highest | Value | World |
|---|---|---|---|
| Countries With the Most People Living With HIV 2025 | South Africa | 7.6 million | 41.0 million |
| Countries With the Most New HIV Infections 2025 | South Africa | 130,000 | 1.2 million |
| Countries With the Most HIV-Related Deaths 2025 | South Africa | 42,000 | 570,000 |
| Countries With the Highest HIV Rate 2025 | Eswatini | 22.4% | 0.7% |
| Countries With the Highest HIV Infection Rate 2025 | South Africa | 2.4 | 0.15 |
Countries that are missing
UNAIDS does not publish an estimate for every country. There is no 2025 figure for the United States, China, Russia, Ukraine, Côte d'Ivoire, Iran, Iraq, Türkiye, Japan, South Korea, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Poland or Canada, so none of them appears in the rankings. All figures are model estimates with uncertainty ranges, rounded by UNAIDS, which is why some countries share a value. For another view of health around the world, see our post on where people live the longest.