Korea - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Korea was 83.43 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 83.43 in 2020 and a minimum value of 55.42 in 1960.

Definition: Life expectancy at birth indicates the number of years a newborn infant would live if prevailing patterns of mortality at the time of its birth were to stay the same throughout its life.

Source: (1) United Nations Population Division. World Population Prospects: 2019 Revision, or derived from male and female life expectancy at birth from sources such as: (2) Census reports and other statistical publications from national statistical offices, (3)

See also:

Year Value
1960 55.42
1961 56.01
1962 56.51
1963 56.97
1964 57.44
1965 57.97
1966 58.58
1967 59.24
1968 59.94
1969 60.68
1970 62.16
1971 62.61
1972 63.01
1973 63.41
1974 63.80
1975 64.15
1976 64.50
1977 64.90
1978 65.20
1979 65.55
1980 66.05
1981 66.55
1982 67.10
1983 67.55
1984 68.20
1985 68.80
1986 69.45
1987 70.00
1988 70.55
1989 71.05
1990 71.60
1991 72.05
1992 72.50
1993 73.00
1994 73.40
1995 73.70
1996 74.15
1997 74.60
1998 75.00
1999 75.41
2000 75.91
2001 76.41
2002 76.77
2003 77.21
2004 77.67
2005 78.17
2006 78.67
2007 79.12
2008 79.52
2009 79.97
2010 80.12
2011 80.57
2012 80.82
2013 81.27
2014 81.72
2015 82.02
2016 82.28
2017 82.63
2018 82.63
2019 83.23
2020 83.43

Development Relevance: Mortality rates for different age groups (infants, children, and adults) and overall mortality indicators (life expectancy at birth or survival to a given age) are important indicators of health status in a country. Because data on the incidence and prevalence of diseases are frequently unavailable, mortality rates are often used to identify vulnerable populations. And they are among the indicators most frequently used to compare socioeconomic development across countries.

Limitations and Exceptions: Annual data series from United Nations Population Division's World Population Prospects are interpolated data from 5-year period data. Therefore they may not reflect real events as much as observed data.

Statistical Concept and Methodology: Life expectancy at birth used here is the average number of years a newborn is expected to live if mortality patterns at the time of its birth remain constant in the future. It reflects the overall mortality level of a population, and summarizes the mortality pattern that prevails across all age groups in a given year. It is calculated in a period life table which provides a snapshot of a population's mortality pattern at a given time. It therefore does not reflect the mortality pattern that a person actually experiences during his/her life, which can be calculated in a cohort life table. High mortality in young age groups significantly lowers the life expectancy at birth. But if a person survives his/her childhood of high mortality, he/she may live much longer. For example, in a population with a life expectancy at birth of 50, there may be few people dying at age 50. The life expectancy at birth may be low due to the high childhood mortality so that once a person survives his/her childhood, he/she may live much longer than 50 years.

Aggregation method: Weighted average

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Health Indicators

Sub-Topic: Mortality