Global Unemployment: Headline Rate, Youth Unemployment and NEET Rates

The ILO projects the global unemployment rate to stay at 4.9% in 2026, equal to 186 million people [1]. The ILO describes the headline rate as stable while job quality has stalled [1].

Young people face a weaker market. Youth unemployment climbed to 12.4% in 2025 [1]. The Global Employment Trends for Youth 2026 report, published on 11 August 2026, puts this at 67 million unemployed people aged 15-24 [2].

After reaching its lowest level in more than two decades in 2023, youth unemployment rose from 12.3% in 2023 to 12.4% in 2025 [3]. Over the same period the adult rate (ages 25 and over) fell from 3.7% to 3.6% [3].

The youth-to-adult unemployment ratio reached 3.4 in 2025, which the ILO reads as a sign that economies are struggling to onboard young workers [3]. Some of the sharpest rises in youth unemployment were in higher-income economies [2].

The global youth NEET rate rose to 20% in 2025 from 19.7% in 2023, adding 9 million young people in NEET status [3]. The total was more than 257 million in 2025 [2].

The ILO projects the NEET rate to keep rising by about 0.1 percentage points a year to 20.2% in 2027 [4]. With a growing youth cohort, that means about 7.4 million more NEET youth between 2025 and 2027, taking the total above 264 million [4]. In low-income countries, NEET rates are 27.9% [1].

The Arab States and Northern Africa have the world's highest youth unemployment rates, at 26.2% and 22.6% respectively [3]. In the same two subregions, youth NEET rates are 32.4% and 30.1% [3]. That means at least one in three young people there is outside work, education and training [3].

Headline unemployment figures come from the ILO Employment and Social Trends 2026 press release [1]. Youth figures come from the ILO press release and report PDFs for Global Employment Trends for Youth 2026 [2] [3] [4]. Youth means ages 15-24 and adults ages 25 and over. The 2026 headline rate and the 2027 NEET values are ILO projections; 2023 and 2025 values are ILO estimates. No FREEE.REPORT calculations are used beyond restating ILO figures.