AmericaUnited States / Environment
U.S. PM2.5 Air Pollution Exposure.
What does average fine-particle exposure conceal?
The historical record
Older reporting period2023
Latest observation in this snapshot—not a real-time reading. -0.5 µg/m³ vs 2022.
Fitted vertical axis · missing periods are not interpolated · annual
What the number means
Population-weighted annual exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2.5).
Population-weighted national exposure is a modeled average, not a reading from someone’s neighborhood monitor. Local hotspots and uncertainty matter. Changes in the average cannot establish the safety of a specific place.
Modeled exposure. National averages conceal local hotspots and are not a personal exposure reading.
A better question to ask
Environmental projects should identify the affected area, exposure measure, monitoring approach, and who receives the benefits.
This is a prompt for investigation, not evidence that a particular policy works. A trend alone cannot establish a cause.
Read the related practical guide ↗Exact observations
24 available observations since 2000. Annual and quarterly dates represent the start of the reporting period; fiscal years are labeled explicitly. Display values are rounded to the precision shown; downloads retain the source values.
Open the complete data table
| Reporting period | Period start | Value |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 2023-01-01 | 7.0 |
| 2022 | 2022-01-01 | 7.4 |
| 2021 | 2021-01-01 | 8.2 |
| 2020 | 2020-01-01 | 7.7 |
| 2019 | 2019-01-01 | 7.3 |
| 2018 | 2018-01-01 | 7.8 |
| 2017 | 2017-01-01 | 7.7 |
| 2016 | 2016-01-01 | 7.4 |
| 2015 | 2015-01-01 | 8.1 |
| 2014 | 2014-01-01 | 8.4 |
| 2013 | 2013-01-01 | 8.4 |
| 2012 | 2012-01-01 | 8.7 |
| 2011 | 2011-01-01 | 9.4 |
| 2010 | 2010-01-01 | 9.3 |
| 2009 | 2009-01-01 | 9.4 |
| 2008 | 2008-01-01 | 10.3 |
| 2007 | 2007-01-01 | 10.9 |
| 2006 | 2006-01-01 | 11.7 |
| 2005 | 2005-01-01 | 13.3 |
| 2004 | 2004-01-01 | 12.6 |
| 2003 | 2003-01-01 | 13.3 |
| 2002 | 2002-01-01 | 13.6 |
| 2001 | 2001-01-01 | 13.7 |
| 2000 | 2000-01-01 | 14.5 |
Follow this series home
- Series identifier
- EN.ATM.PM25.MC.M3
- Provider
- World Bank / original statistical sources
- Original source attribution
- Global Burden of Disease Study 2023 (GBD 2023) Air Pollution Exposure Estimates and Risk Curves 1990-2023, GBD Collaborator Network, uri: https://ghdx.healthdata.org/record/ihme-data/gbd-2023-air-pollution-exposure-estimates-1990-2023, note: Need to create account to retrieve data., publisher: Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), date accessed: 2026-04-03, date published: 2026-01-23
- Frequency
- Annual
- Source units
- µg/m³
- Displayed units
- µg/m³
- Retrieval time
- 2026-10-04T09:04:46.416Z
- Provider database update
- 2026-07-13 — not the observation date
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