The Church has released year-end 2022 membership and congregation totals
for most nations with a reported Church presence. These statistics can
be accessed on Church's official website at https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/facts-and-statistics.
Only Samoa and Russia were omitted from the
analysis below because either membership data were not reported for year-end 2021 (Russia) or the Church had not updated its membership figure for 2021 (Samoa) and consequently it is unclear how much membership increased for the year 2022.
Countries with the highest annual membership growth rates for 2022 are listed below. Lists for nations with the most rapid
annual membership
growth rates are also available for 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. A list of the biennial membership growth rates for countries between year-end 2019 to year-end 2021 can be found here. The percentage next to the country name for the list below is the annual membership growth rate
for 2022. Countries in bold experienced
a membership increase greater than 200 during 2022
- Burundi - 50.7% - 1,240
- Rwanda - 36.9% -1,154
- Tanzania - 29.9% - 2,999
- Mozambique - 18.6% - 18,443
- Benin - 17.7% - 5,606
- Republic of the Congo - 16.1% - 11,481
- Iceland - 15.4% - 382
- Democratic Republic of the Congo - 15.4% - 102,862
- Turkey - 14.8% - 658
- Angola - 14.4% - 4,760
- Liberia - 14.1% - 20,335
- Cameroon - 13.0% - 2,721
- Kazakhstan - 11.7% - 229
- Namibia - 11.2% - 1,110
- Sierra Leone - 10.6% - 28,867
- Bahrain - 10.5% - 252
- Dominica - 10.3% - 160
The
following is a list of the top ten countries with the highest negative
membership growth rates (i.e., fastest rate of membership decline) during 2022. The percent growth rate is provided next
to the country name, and the number to the right of the percentage
growth rate is the year-end 2022 membership total for the country.
- Ukraine - -7.8% - 10,344
- Singapore - -2.9% - 3,202
- Isle of Man - -2.4% - 281
- Republic of Georgia - -2.3% - 252
- Federated States of Micronesia - -2.3% - 5,966
- Marshall Islands - -2.1% - 6,832
- Netherlands - -1.9% - 9,185
- Cook Islands - -1.6% - 1,862
- Slovakia - -1.3% - 305
- Martinique - -1.1% - 258
Below is a list of the top ten countries by numerical
membership net increase for 2022. Each country is provided with the
numerical national
increase in membership for the year. Additionally, the percentage of total church
membership increase that is accounted for by each country is provided (i.e., a percentage of the world membership increase for 2022 that is within that country). Lists are also
available for 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. A list of the biennial period of 2020-2021 is also available. 65.3% of the 2022 net increase in Church membership can be attributed to
the following 10 nations.
- United States - 41,009 - 20.8%
- Philippines - 20,209 - 10.3%
- Brazil - 16,283 - 8.3%
- Democratic Republic of the Congo - 13,726 - 7.0%
- Nigeria - 9,953 - 5.1%
- Mexico - 9,424 - 4.8%
- Peru - 5,530 - 2.8%
- Ghana - 5,416 - 2.7%
- Bolivia - 3,699 - 1.9%
- Ecuador - 3,453 - 1.8%
Below
is a list of the top ten countries by numerical membership decrease for
the biennial period of 2020-2021. Each country is provided with the
numerical national decrease in membership for this two-year period. There were only six countries that experienced a
net decreased by 100 or more during 2022.
- Ukraine - -872
- Hong Kong - -248
- Puerto Rico - -230
- Netherlands - -180
- Marshall Islands --145
- Federated States of Micronesia - -141
ANALYSIS OF COUNTRY-BY-COUNTRY MEMBERSHIP FIGURES FOR 2022
Here is an analysis of these numbers:
First, annual membership growth rates significantly accelerated for many countries where the Church has historically experienced rapid membership growth in comparison to not only during 2020-2021 but also during 2019, 2018, and 2017. This indicates that annual membership growth rates have not only returned to previous levels prior to the COVID-19 pandemic in many of the nations where the Church usually reports its most rapid growth, but that membership growth rates have actually increased since prior to the pandemic. In 2019, there were only 11 countries where church membership increased by 10% or more during the year (and only 11 in 2018 and 13 in 2017), whereas there were 17 countries where church membership increased by 10% or more during 2022. There were also three countries which had an annual membership growth rate of 20% or more during 2022 (all of which had over 1,000 members by the end of the year), whereas in 2019 there were only two countries that had an annual membership growth rate of more than 20% (and one of these had only 36 members at the end of the year). Even more impressive, there were only two countries with 10,000 or more members in 2019 where the annual membership growth rate was at least 10% during the year (Mozambique and the DR Congo), whereas there were five countries with 10,000 or more members in 2022 that had an annual membership growth rate of 10% or more during the year (Mozambique, the Republic of the Congo, the DR Congo, Liberia, and Sierra Leone). The last year there were at least five countries with at least 10,000 members when annual membership growth rates exceeded 10% for the year was in 2014 (and the countries where Cote d'Ivoire, Sierra Leone, the DR Congo, Cape Verde, and Nigeria). To put this into perspective, there were some years in the 2000s (such as 2007 and 2008) when there were no countries with at least 10,000 membership that had an annual membership growth rate of at least 10%. Moreover, this also marks the first time in 30 years since the Church has achieved an annual membership growth rate of 10% of higher in a country (i.e., the DR Congo) where there are at least 100,000 members (the last time this occurred was in Ecuador in 1992-1993).
Second, Africa stands out as the world region where the majority of the most rapid membership growth occurs. Of the 17 countries that had an annual membership growth rate of 10% or more, 12 were in Africa. Also, all five countries outside of Africa where Church membership increased by 10% or more have fewer than 1,000 members. In Africa, the countries that have stood as consistent high performers for rapid membership growth rates in the past decade include Angola, Benin, the DR Congo, Liberia, Mozambique, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone. Outside of Africa, there are few countries that regularly have annual membership growth rates of 10% or more (and nearly all of these have very few members), but these nations include Turkey, the Solomon Islands (which experienced stagnant growth in 2022 primarily due to no missionaries assigned to the country), and Tuvalu (which also experienced stagnant growth in 2022, although it is unclear whether this may be because the membership figure was not updated since it is identical for 2021).
Third, membership growth is becoming more equalized among countries in the world than it used to be. In 2008, 77% of membership growth in the worldwide Church occurred just in 10 countries (the United States, Brazil, Mexico, Philippines, Peru, Argentina, Chile, Honduras, Guatemala, and Colombia). However, only 65% of membership growth in the worldwide Church occurred in the 10 countries with the highest net increases in Church membership during the year 2022. A more distributed membership growth dynamic has been a function of two processes: 1. Countries the most members have experienced decelerating growth and 2. some countries with small to medium size membership are growing at the same rate of more rapidly. For example, the Church in Mexico (country with the second most members) reported its slowest annual membership growth rate (0.63%) in over 70 years in 2022, and the Church in Brazil (country with the third most members) reported one of its slowest membership growth rates ever (1.1%) in 2022.
Fourth, countries with annual membership growth rates of 5.0-9.9% generally follow the same trends as countries with 10% or more annual membership growth. In 2022, there were 16 countries where membership growth increased within this rage of which 11 were in Africa. The countries that were not in Africa included Malta (9.4% annual membership growth rate), Cyprus (9.4%), Israel (8.0%), Montenegro (6.7%), and Guernsey (5.3%) - all of which had fewer than 1,000 members. Most of these nations have previously ranked among countries with the most rapid membership growth rates in the past 15 years, albeit these nations also often have wide fluctuations in growth (including decline).
Fifth, annual membership growth rates in the United States slightly increased in 2022 compared to recent years. Membership in the United States increased by 0.61% in 2022, whereas the Church reported an increase of 0.62% for the two-year period including 2020 and 2021 (suggesting the annual membership growth rate was likely around 0.30% for these years assuming the rate of growth was constant during that time). Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Church reported annual membership growth rates of 0.59% in 2019 and 0.60% in 2018. Annual membership growth rates in the United States remain far below previous years which averaged 1.0-1.5% in the early to mid 2010s and 1.5-2.0% in the 1990s and 2000s.
Sixth, there were several "anomaly" countries where membership growth trends in 2022 were significantly different than what has been typically seen in recent years. Here are a few of some of the notable examples I found browsing the data. In Spain, the annual membership growth rate (3.37%) was the highest reported by the Church since 2010. This is an impressive development considering the Church in most of Europe experiences essentially stagnant growth (or slight decline). In Kenya, the Church also reported its most rapid membership growth (9.6%) seen since 2010. In Burundi, Church membership increased by approximately 50% - the most rapid growth seen since 2013. In Ukraine, the Church reported a significant decline of 7.8% which was caused primarily by Ukrainian Latter-day Saints leaving the country due to the war. The Church published figures for the number of members in Russia as of year-end 2022 - the first time this has been done since 2017 when there were 23,252 members. However, the Church reported a mere 4,995 members as of year-end 2022. It is unclear whether this may be a reporting error or if this may reflect a mass exodus of Russian Latter-day Saints to other nations. However, this figure may be accurate given scores of congregations have closed in Russia since Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In Iceland, membership increased by 15.4% - the highest reported since 2001 (albeit, to put this into perspective, there were only 382 members on the records for Iceland as of year-end 2022).
