Which countries receive the most foreign aid?

Foreign aid is the provision of money, goods, or services from one country to another, usually to support the people in a lower-income country.

Supporters of aid highlight successful organizations and programs, such as PEPFAR, which has saved millions of lives from HIV and AIDS, and GAVI, which has vaccinated hundreds of millions of children against diseases, among many others.

But foreign aid projects can fail and, in the worst cases, cause harm. Foreign aid can disrupt local economies and political systems and make governments more responsive to foreign powers than their own citizens.

Critics of foreign aid point to failures like the WHO’s Global Malaria Eradication Program in the 1950s and ’60s, or India’s aid-supported family planning and sterilization program in the 1970s.

On this new page, you can explore data on foreign aid across 31 charts.