Adult literacy rate in Philippines

Adult literacy rate in the Philippines was 98.5% in 2020, according to UNESCO Institute for Statistics. That is up 2.2 pts from 2019. That is the 18th highest of 56 countries in 2019.

202098.5%
Change on 2019+2.2 pts
Rank18th of 56Countries ranked
Series high98.52020
Series low83.31980

Adult literacy rate in Philippines, 1980 to 2020

808590951001980199420032010201520201980: 83.3 %1990: 93.6 %1994: 93.9 %2000: 92.6 %2003: 92.6 %2008: 95.4 %2010: 97.1 %2013: 96.4 %2015: 98.2 %2019: 96.3 %2020: 98.5 %
%. Source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics, Literacy rate, adult total, % of people ages 15 and above (SE.ADT.LITR.ZS) via World Bank, World Development Indicators. Retrieved 2026-10-12, published 2026-10-08.
All 11 values
Period%
202098.5
201996.3
201598.2
201396.4
201097.1
200895.4
200392.6
200092.6
199493.9
199093.6
198083.3

Rankings

Definition

People aged 15 and over who can both read and write, with understanding, a short simple statement about their everyday life, as a percentage of the population aged 15 and over. UNESCO Institute for Statistics.

UIS figures from censuses, household surveys and UIS model estimates. Most high-income countries stopped measuring literacy decades ago, so they have no value; a missing value is not a rate of 0 or 100. Countries report in different years, so a ranking for one year covers only some countries.

How to cite

Source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS). Literacy rate, adult total, % of people ages 15 and above (SE.ADT.LITR.ZS). Retrieved through World Bank World Development Indicators (data.worldbank.org). https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SE.ADT.LITR.ZS. Retrieved 2026-10-12. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. UIS does not endorse Invokely or this use of the data.

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Questions

What is the adult literacy rate in Philippines?

Adult literacy rate in the Philippines was 98.5% in 2020, according to UNESCO Institute for Statistics. That is up 2.2 pts from 2019. That is the 18th highest of 56 countries in 2019.

Where does this figure come from?

UNESCO Institute for Statistics. Literacy rate, adult total, % of people ages 15 and above (SE.ADT.LITR.ZS). Retrieved by Invokely on 2026-10-12.

What was the highest adult literacy rate in Philippines?

98.5% in 2020, the highest value since 1980 in this series.

Adult literacy rate in other countries

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