Great Commission Statistics

• 9,478 people groups by country are NOT Least-Reached, totaling 3,892,985,000 individuals, or about 59% of the world's population.

• 1,502 of the Least-Reached groups are NOT in the 10/40 Window, totaling 368,380,000 individuals. These groups are relatively accessible to the Good News of the Gospel.

• Of the 6,817 Least-Reached people groups, about 3,613 (53%) are small groups under 10,000 in population (or population unknown) and all these groups total less than 20,000,000 individuals. Of the remaining 3,204 least-reached groups, about 1,335 are under 50,000 in population. That leaves 1,869 Least-Reached groups 50,000 and over in population. A vibrant church in a large group may take the gospel to a number of smaller satellite people groups that have ethnic similarities.

• Of the world's 6,516 living languages (Ethnologue total), 4,311 have either/all Bible portions, the Jesus film, gospel radio, or gospel recordings. Total speakers of these languages is 6,100,000,000, or over 95% of the world's population.

• Of 236 total countries, 169 (72%) are Christian-majority countries. Total population for these countries is 2,320,000,000.

• There are 8,007 people groups (of the 16,295) with fewer than 10,000 individuals, in addition there are 693 for which no population has been reported (but the population is probably small). For all these small groups, the total number of individuals is less than 20,000,000 meaning that 53% of the 16,295 people groups contain only a tiny fraction of the world's population.

• Of the 16,295 total groups, Joshua Project has identified 6,817 as Least-Reached, totaling 2,712,496,000 individuals. Of these 6,817 groups, 5,315 are in 10/40 Window countries. That means 78% of the unreached / least-reached people groups are in the 10/40 Window.

• The largest least-reached group is the Japanese, with over 120,000,000 individuals.

• 3,288 groups are primarily Muslim, totaling nearly 1,300,000,000 individuals.

• 2,669 groups are primarily Hindu, totaling about 900,000,000 individuals.

• 572 groups are primarily Buddhist, totaling nearly 375,000,000 individuals.

• 6,359 groups are primarily Christian, totaling over 2,000,000,000 individuals. "Christian" is defined here as Christian adherents, not restricted to evangelicals.

• The Mandarin Chinese is the largest people group, being in 98 countries with a total of about 793,000,000 individuals, and with 783,000,000 of those in China.

• Jews are found in 130 countries, Arabs in 84 countries, and Chinese groups in 117 countries.

• India has the largest number of ethnic people groups, 2,327 in the Joshua Project database. (The number of people groups in India varies greatly depending on the researcher and how the term "people group" is defined. Strictly linguistically there are about 330 - 350 "people groups" in India. Some suggest the 2,327 groups in the Joshua Project list should be sub-divided into groups by Indian state, producing a total of about 4,700). For further information, see the ethno-linguistic vs. ethnic discussion on the definitions page.

• Papua New Guinea is the runner-up in number of people groups, at 872. Interestingly, the largest group of these 872 is only 394,300 in population. The total population of the country is only 5,835,000, yet there are nearly 900 people groups. Indonesia (765) and Nigeria (505) follow Papua New Guinea.

• On the other end of the spectrum, South Korea only has seven people groups, with a country population of 47,841,000.

• There are 1,050 languages/dialects spoken in Papua New Guinea. There are only 45 languages/dialects spoken in Japan, which has a population over 25 times as large as Papua New Guinea. The diversity of Papua New Guinea and the homogeneity of Japan!

• In India, one people group (the Gond) speaks 78 languages. 1,402 groups (out of the total of 2,327) speak more than one language.

• One people group in India (Nai), has 70 alternate names. 4,000 of the over 16,000 total peoples-by-country have more than one alternate people name.

• Of the 16,295 people groups in the Joshua Project database, 14% speak more than one language ignoring dialects, and 24% if dialects are included.

• There are 51 Muslim majority countries, of which 23 have GDP per capita less than $1,000 (710,000,000 individuals). This includes oil revenues. None of the Muslim countries are identified as Developed by the World Bank.

• There are four Hindu majority countries, of which three (India-$459, Nepal-$239, Guyana-$936) have GDP per capita less than $1,000 (1,100,000,000 individuals). None of the Hindu countries are identified as Developed.

• There are 169 Christian majority countries, of which 33 have GDP per capita less than $1,000 and 129 exceed $999. 32 Christian majority countries are identified as Developed by the World Bank.

• There are approximately 6,900 total languages in the world, with about 6,500 considered "living" and the remaining 400 "extinct" or "near-extinct" per the Ethnologue. Approximately 2,400 languages have some or all of the Bible.

About 4,100 languages are without Scripture portions available, with some 450,000,000 speakers. Translation projects are in progress in an estimated 1,600 languages that currently are without adequate Scriptures. There are about 2,500 languages needing Bible translation work to begin.

• There are 993 languages with the Jesus film available, 324 with Gospel radio available, and 4,100 with Gospel recordings available (plus approximately 2000 language recordings that have not had Ethnologue codes assigned yet). 2,205 languages have none of these resources available, with about 195,000,000 speakers.

• 90% of the world's people, if they have an internet cafe and the funds, can hear the gospel in a language they understand.

• There is a 90% chance that a foreign Christian meeting a non-believer overseas could find a gospel recording on-line and give it as a gift to any non-believer they meet and it would be understood.

• Only 3% of the world's people speak a language that does not yet have a gospel recording.

• 97% of the world's people are members of language groups who have had at least one person presented with the plan of salvation.

• About 40% of the world's language groups (divided by country) still do not have any gospel recording in their language. (approx 4100 total groups when divided by country.)