by Rod Williams, Dec. 17, 2025- The Cato Institute and the Fraser Institute have just published the annual Human Freedom Index ranking 167 nations from most free to least free. The United States comes in at number 15. The above list shows the fifteen highest-ranking countries for human freedom. The score range is from one to ten, with a ten being the most free and a one being the least free, however no scores of one or ten are awarded. The least free nations are listed below:
Other nations of interest to me and their rankings are Germany 17, United Kingdom 19, France 33, Mexico 91, El Salvadore 83, Ukraine at 119, and China at 149.
The Human Freedom Index (HFI) presents a broad measure of human freedom, understood as the absence of coercive constraint. This 11th annual index uses 87 distinct indicators of personal and economic freedom in the following areas:
Rule of lawSecurity and safetyMovementReligionAssociation, assembly, and civil societyExpression and informationRelationshipsSize of governmentLegal system and property rightsSound moneyFreedom to trade internationallyRegulation
I am not surprised by the rankings. While many may think the US is the freest nation on earth, I have been aware that there are other nations with more freedom than the United States for some time. The US ranking has fallen in recent years. In 2007, the US was the seventh freest country in the world; in 2021, it had dropped to 18th place.
While one could quibble over the weight given to various factors in scoring the nations, one observation I make is that having the right to bear arms does not make one more free than some nations without the right to bear arms. Another observation is that one can have universal health care and a generous welfare state and still be free.
As one would expect, the nations of Africa and the Mid-East rank lowest. The status of women in those nations is contributing to their low scores. There is a strong relationship between freedom and median and per capita income. Jurisdictions in the top quartile of freedom enjoy a significantly higher average per capita income ($53,635) than those in other quartiles; the average per capita income in the least free quartile is $14,201. The HFI also finds a strong positive relationship between human freedom and democracy, and between human freedom and a range of human well-being indicators, including tolerance, charitable giving, life expectancy, and environmental health, among other measures.
For more on the methodology and an understanding of weights given to various factors and an examination of a nation's change in ranking over time, view the index at this link.
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