Poverty · People & Poverty
People without adequate housing
Homeless or living in grossly inadequate shelter
2,800,000,000
Current total · 2025
What this number is
A modelled estimate of people without secure, adequate housing.
UN-Habitat estimates that 2.8 billion people lack access to adequate housing, secure land, and basic water and sanitation services. Definitions of homelessness differ sharply between countries, so global totals are modelled rather than counted.
Why it matters
Housing is the clearest line between poverty and destitution.
How it is produced
National housing censuses combined and modelled to a common definition.
Plato's Cave classifies this figure as MODELLED. Modelled figures are outputs of assumptions. Change the assumptions and the number moves, even when the world does not.
How to read it carefully
Only one credible source currently supports this figure. It is reported here as a single-source claim, not a settled fact.
Reference period: 2025. Last checked: Sep 8, 2026.
Plato's Cave commentary
Poverty lines are decisions, not discoveries. Move the threshold by a small amount and hundreds of millions of people cross it without anything changing in their lives.
This is why Plato's Cave shows both the share and the headcount. A falling percentage and a rising number of people can be true at the same time.