It’s official — Finland is the happiest country in the world for the sixth year in a row.
Ireland has slipped down the ranking of happiest countries by one place, to number 14, while the UK has fallen two places to 19th, according to the latest World Happiness Report.
The report placed Denmark and Iceland in the top three, behind Finland, with Switzerland having slipped from third spot last year to eighth place.
Researchers ranked countries after analysing data over three years, including gross domestic product per capita, social safety nets, life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity of the population, and perceptions of internal and external corruption levels.
Afghanistan and Lebanon have been deemed the least happy countries in the world, according to the report.
Lithuania is the only new country in the top twenty — having climbed more than 30 places since 2017.
The survey notes that despite several overlapping crises, most populations around the world continue to be remarkably resilient, with global life satisfaction averages in the covid-19 years 2020-2022 just as high as those in the pre-pandemic years.
The report was launched to mark the 10th International Day of Happiness.
The top ten happiest countries are: Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Israel, Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Luxembourg, New Zealand.
Ukraine is ranked at 92nd in the list of happiest countries, while Russia stands in 70th place.
One of the researchers who compiled the report, Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, director of the Wellbeing Research Centre at the University of Oxford, said: “The devastating impact of the war is evident to all, and so we also find that well-being in Ukraine has taken a real hit.
“But what is surprising, however, is that well-being in Ukraine fell by less than it did in 2014 when Russia annexed Crimea, and this is thanks in part to the extraordinary rise in fellow feeling across Ukraine as picked up in data on helping strangers and donations — the Russian invasion has forged Ukraine into a nation.”