- Unit
- % of GDP
- Periodicity
- Annual
- License
- CC BY-4.0
Definition
Military expenditure by country as percentage of gross domestic product
Statistical concept
Although the lack of sufficiently detailed data makes it difficult to apply a common definition of military expenditure on a worldwide basis, SIPRI has adopted a definition as a guideline. Where possible, SIPRI military expenditure data include all current and capital expenditure on: (a) the armed forces, including peacekeeping forces; (b) defense ministries and other government agencies engaged in defense projects; (c) paramilitary forces, when judged to be trained and equipped for military operations; and (d) military space activities.
This should include expenditure on: (i) personnel, including: salaries of military and civil personnel; b. retirement pensions of military personnel, and; social services for personnel; (ii) operations and maintenance; (iii) procurement; (iv) military research and development; (v) military infrastructure spending, including military bases; and (vi) military aid (in the military expenditure of the donor country).
SIPRI’s estimate of military aid includes financial contributions, training and operational costs, replacement costs of the military equipment stocks donated to recipients and payments to procure additional military equipment for the recipient. However, it does not include the estimated value of military equipment stocks donated.
Civil defense and spending related to past military activities—like veterans’ benefits or demobilization—are excluded. Because many countries do not publish data detailed enough to perfectly match SIPRI’s definition, SIPRI often relies on national figures and prioritizes internal consistency over time rather than strict cross-country uniformity. As a result, SIPRI data are most reliable for analyzing trends rather than precise comparisons between countries, and users should consult footnotes for known deviations from the definition.
Methodology
Military expenditure data is collected from primary and secondary sources. Primary sources include official government publications such as national budgets, defense white papers, financial statistics, and responses to questionnaires from SIPRI, the UN, or the OSCE, as well as expert analyses of government budgets. Secondary sources draw on these primary materials and include international datasets produced by organizations like NATO and the IMF, as well as reference works such as the German Statistisches Jahrbuch, the Europa Yearbook, and Economist Intelligence Unit country reports. Other secondary sources are journals and newspapers. Historically, especially before 1988, secondary sources (notably IMF and UN statistics) were used more heavily due to limited availability of official national data. In recent years, the availability of primary government data has increased significantly.
SIPRI uses government-reported military expenditure data as the baseline and only produces its own estimates when official data are incomplete or inconsistent across years. Estimates are created through detailed budget analysis or by merging overlapping data sources, giving priority to those that best fit SIPRI’s definition, are up-to-date, and provide continuous time series. Older pre-1988 data often required combining secondary sources like IMF GFS and UNSY, which differ in definitions (e.g., excluding military pensions). SIPRI avoids making assumptions and does not estimate spending for countries lacking any official data. In SIPRI’s database, estimated values appear in blue, while figures considered uncertain, because of weak sources or volatile conditions, appear in red. For recent years, budget projections and deflator-based adjustments are common but flagged only when uncertainty is unusually high.
SIPRI presents military expenditure data on a calendar-year basis (except for the U.S., which uses financial years) and converts figures to constant prices using national consumer price indices to reflect opportunity costs. Local-currency data are converted to US dollars using average market exchange rates.
Military spending as a share of GDP (“military burden”) is calculated using nominal local-currency values for both military expenditure and GDP. SIPRI also provides military spending as a share of total government expenditure, where IMF data permit.
For additional information, please refer to the SIPRI website: https://www.sipri.org/databases/milex
Limitations and exceptions
SIPRI strives to compile reliable, consistent military expenditure data by assessing multiple sources, but accuracy depends on the quality and transparency of those sources. Challenges arise from two key issues: whether reported figures reflect actual spending and how closely they match SIPRI’s definition. While data is generally accurate in developed and many developing countries, weak governance, corruption, and secret transfers in others can lead to major discrepancies. SIPRI sometimes makes estimates, when sources conflict or lack coverage, introducing uncertainty, especially for countries like China or the UAE. Definitions also vary: official defense budgets may omit pensions, paramilitary forces, or extra- and off-budget spending such as resource funds or military commercial activities, which can be substantial but often untraceable, particularly in Africa, the Middle East, and parts of Asia. SIPRI notes these gaps in footnotes, but where figures cannot be obtained, estimates remain incomplete, limiting comparability across countries.
Relevance
Although national defense is an important function of government and security from external threats that contributes to economic development, high military expenditures for defense or civil conflicts burden the economy and may impede growth. Data on military expenditures as a share of gross domestic product (GDP) are a rough indicator of the portion of national resources used for military activities and of the burden on the economy.
As an "input" measure military expenditures are not directly related to the "output" of military activities, capabilities, or security. Comparisons of military spending among countries should take into account the many factors that influence perceptions of vulnerability and risk, including historical and cultural traditions, the length of borders that need defending, the quality of relations with neighbors, and the role of the armed forces in the body politic.
Comparisons of military spending among countries should take into account the many factors that influence perceptions of vulnerability and risk, including historical and cultural traditions, the length of borders that need defending, the quality of relations with neighbors, and the role of the armed forces in the body politic.
Aggregation method
Weighted average
Source references
- https://www.sipri.org/databases
- SIPRI Military Expenditure Database: Sources and methods
License terms: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Metadata retrieved 2026-09-04T19:40:54.066Z
Source and provenanceHide provenance
- Provider
- World Bank Data360
- Dataset
- WB_WDI
- Indicator ID
- WB_WDI_MS_MIL_XPND_GD_ZS
- Endpoint
- /data360/data
- Retrieved
- 2026-09-04T19:40:48.295Z
- Delivery
- Served from cache
- License
- Not recorded on this record
- Attribution
- Source data retrieved from the World Bank Data360 API. The World Bank does not endorse this application or any analytic judgment presented in it, and does not verify the methodology of third-party datasets it redistributes.