Using Peoplegroups.org
Be empowered to pray and act today.
Explore profiles of people groups, countries, languages, and religions. Visualize key statistics and discover how to pray effectively. Download filtered data to create your own resources.
Learn about unreached people groups, research methodology, and how to get involved. New to this topic? Start with our definitions page to understand UPGs, UUPGs, and more.
Access Resources including downloadable maps, lists, and media for every people group. Everything is free—our mission is to mobilize prayer and action worldwide.
Note: There is a known bug on some older iPads with Safari browser that can cause the interactive maps to crash. Switch to another browser on iOS if possible.
About our Interactive Maps
No single map can provide a full picture of spiritual lostness. But when several maps are used together – such as the SPI and GSEC maps by people group, maps showing the percentage and number of people dying daily, maps of engagement and evangelical presence, and maps like the weighted GSEC map –a fuller, more complete view of lostness in a country and among its people groups can come into view. Note: Due to screen size and visualizations, the below maps are not available on mobile devices.
The People Groups of the World (SPI) map
This map contains a unique point for every people group in the world. Each dot is colored according to its Strategic Progress Index (SPI), where red is an Unengaged and Unreached People Group (UUPG), orange is an Engaged yet Unreached People Group (UPG), and green is a No Longer Unreached People Group. This map highlights certain people groups based on engagement status and percentage of evangelical population among that group.
Possible use cases:
– Discuss with your team, church, or organization the diversity of people groups and their concentration, according to SPI. This helps determine where you might consider sending teams, where the work is needed, and/or from whom and to whom mobilization needs to happen.
– Discover the people groups of the world, then drill-down (by clicking a point) into a specific people group and get information about their exact location and demographics. This map is a simple and easy way to locate people groups.
– Filter this map by clicking on one of the scale values in the legend to see exactly which people groups are within each category.
*Explore this map on our People Groups of the World page or get it in print on our Maps page.*
The People Groups of the World (GSEC) map
This map contains a unique point for every people group in the world. Each dot is colored according to its Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC). In use since 2005 and famous for its ability to showcase the urgency of the task, this map displays a scale from 0 to 6 that combines the state of the Church (the presence of Christians and churches within a people group), the availability of Scripture resources, the people group’s current status of engagement (Unengaged or Engaged), the church planting efforts within the past two years, and the people group’s evangelical percentage. This map assists the Great Commission community in identifying people groups that currently have the least possibility of having disciples made and churches planted among them.
Possible use cases:
– Discuss with your team, church, or organization the diversity of people groups and their concentration, according to GSEC. This helps determine where you might consider sending teams, where the work (translation, church planting, etc.) is needed, and/or from whom and to whom mobilization needs to happen.
– Discover the people groups of the world, then drill-down (by clicking a point) into a specific people group and get information about their exact location and demographics. This map is a simple and easy way to locate people groups.
– Filter this map by clicking on one of the scale values in the legend to see exactly which people groups are within each category.
*Explore this map on our People Groups of the World page or get it in print on our Maps page.*
The Unengaged and Unreached Peoples map
An unengaged people group (UUPG) is one where there are no known efforts focused on establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice. This map highlights these specific people groups, mapping them according to population (dot-sized scale).
Possible use cases:
– Discover at a glance the task before us – engaging people groups who don’t have boots-on-the-ground attempting to implement a church planting strategy – specifically where and who they are.
– Discover more information about specific UUPGs and visually filter by population.
*Explore this map on our People Groups of the World page or get it in print on our Maps page. *
Dying Daily without Christ (% of population) map
This map shows, by country, the percentage of the population that are dying without Christ, every day. Essentially 100% means that we know of no or just a few believers in these places, and a desperate need for the gospel.
Possible use cases:
– Discern the utter lostness and urgency of the task among the countries of the world and begin praying that the Lord of the harvest would send laborers into the people groups and places of critical need.
– Discuss with your team, church, or organization the countries that need cross-cultural missionary presence to engage them with the gospel and church planting strategies, and as a team, prayerfully consider sending missionaries to those places.
*Explore this map on our Countries of the World page.*
Dying Daily without Christ (population) map
This map shows, by country, the raw population of people who are dying without Christ, every day. This map highlights places with the largest number of individuals dying daily apart from Christ, even if the percentage of the population dying daily might be lower than other places. When coupled with the percentage of population map and other maps on this site, a compelling picture of lostness emerges.
Possible use cases:
– Discern the utter lostness and urgency of the task among the countries of the world and begin praying that the Lord of the harvest would send laborers into the people groups and places of critical need.
– Discuss with your team, church, or organization the countries that need cross-cultural missionary presence to engage them with the gospel and church planting strategies, and as a team, prayerfully consider sending missionaries to those places.
*Explore this map on our Countries of the World page.
Countries of the World (Weighted GSEC) map
The weighted Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC) map gives another way to look at how “lost” a country is spiritually. The weighted GSEC score for a country is found by taking each People Group’s GSEC score, multiplying it by that group’s population, adding up those numbers for all the groups in the country, and then dividing by the country’s total population. This gives an average score that reflects the percentage of evangelicals, the average access to evangelical resources and Scripture, and the overall level of recent church planting activity.
Possible use cases:
– Discuss with your team, church, or organization possible countries of ministry emphasis based on weighted GSEC. This helps determine countries where you might consider doing more research, sending missionaries, where the work (translation, church planting, etc.) is needed, and/or from whom and to whom mobilization needs to happen.
– Discover the countries of the world that have some of the greatest lostness and overall Kingdom needs and begin praying and sending to these places.
– Couple this map with the GSEC people group map and other maps, such as UUPGs, Frontier and Pioneer peoples to identify areas of tremendous Kingdom need.
*Explore this map on our Countries of the World page.
Frontier Peoples (<0.1%) map
This map shows a point, sized by population that highlights the Frontier People Groups with less than 0.1% evangelical Christians. Frontier peoples are in desperate need of the gospel, and though they are in early phases of engagement, they remain highly unreached.
Possible use cases:
– Discover people groups among whom God has begun moving but are still in desperate need of focused prayer and more laborers.
– Discuss whether your team, church, or organization might consider partnering with teams on the ground to multiply and mobilize the work among some of these critically unreached people groups.
*Explore this map on our People Groups of the World page.
Pioneer Peoples (0.1% to <0.5%) map
This map shows a point, sized by population that highlights the Pioneer People Groups with 0.1% to less than 0.5% evangelical Christians. Pioneer People Groups have usually seen tremendous Kingdom growth caused by God, but often lack sufficient access or saturation of local believer population to propel Kingdom advance without assistance.
Possible use cases:
– Discover people groups among whom God has been moving but are in need of additional laborers and prayerful strategies to multiply and sustain Kingdom work among them.
– Discuss whether your team, church, or organization might consider sending or partnering with teams on the ground to multiply and mobilize the work to see God raise up faithful local laborers who will continue to reach these unreached people groups.
*Explore this map on our People Groups of the World page.
Countries of the World (Affinities) map
Global “affinity groups” are large groupings of related peoples that share similar origins, languages and cultures, which act as a lens through which missionaries view lostness and focus strategy to share the gospel. Focusing strategy through affinity groups gives missionaries a more complete picture of the people they are working to reach as well as the freedom to pursue the lost regardless of their location. This map highlights the “affinity groups” of the world and provides basic high-level statistics about the people groups within a particular country.
Possible use cases:
– Discover the affinity groupings of the people groups of the world.
– Learn more about the people and places in every country within each affinity.
Explore this map on our Countries of the World page or get it in print on our Maps page.
*Only the Advanced Dashboard map is currently available on mobile devices. To experience our regular interactive maps, check them out on a full-size device for an amazing experience!
Explore the People Groups of the World
Map and discover people groups and the status of the gospel among them. Filter, explore, and even download information.