literacy

Latvia leads global literacy rankings at 99.9 percent adult literacy, with Estonia, Lithuania, and a cluster of Eastern European, Northern European, and East Asian countries reporting rates above 99 percent. More than 30 countries have effectively achieved universal adult literacy. At the other end of the spectrum, Niger's adult literacy rate stands at approximately 19 percent — the world's lowest. This ranking covers the top 15 highest-literacy countries using UNESCO Institute for Statistics data, with methodology, caveats, and analysis of what literacy actually measures.

Russia has more libraries than any country — 130,000+ public, school, and special libraries. The United States has the world's largest library (the Library of Congress, with 173 million items). Finland has the highest library visit rate per capita of any country.

China publishes over 500,000 new book titles per year — the world's most. The United States publishes over 4 million including self-published titles. The UK publishes more books per capita than almost any large nation. Here's the global book publishing industry — who leads, what it's worth, and how digital is changing everything.