Muslim Population Mapping

October 12, 2009 – 12:10 am

The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life recently released their new study on the global population of Muslims: Mapping the Global Muslim Population: A Report on the Size and Distribution of the World’s Muslim Population. Among the key findings:

1. There are 1.57 billion Muslims of all ages living in the world today, representing 23% of an estimated 2009 world population of 6.8 billion.
2. While Muslims are found on all five inhabited continents, more than 60% of the global Muslim population is in Asia and about 20% is in the Middle East and North Africa.
3. However, the Middle East-North Africa region has the highest percentage of Muslim-majority countries. Indeed, more than half of the 20 countries and territories.
4. More than 300 million Muslims, or one-fifth of the world’s Muslim population, live in countries where Islam is not the majority religion. These minority Muslim populations are often quite large. India, for example, has the third-largest population of Muslims worldwide. China has more Muslims than Syria, while Russia is home to more Muslims than Jordan and Libya combined.  in that region have populations that are approximately 95% Muslim or greater.
5. The estimate of the United States Muslim population is only 2.5 million. That’s 4.5 million less than President Obama stated in his speech to the Muslim world at Cairo University this past June.

You can read these and other stats related to Islam in the Mapping the Global Muslim Population study.

Also included is an interactive map of where the world’s Muslims live:

Make it a habit to pray for a specific Muslim region or missionary going to a Muslim region when you read stats like this. The cause can seem overwhelming if we fail to remember that Jesus is Lord and will demand that every knee bow to Him. By His grace we will see many former followers of Allah turn to King Jesus before the final day of judgment.

HT: Stand to Reason