Average BMI in Latvia
Men in Latvia have an average BMI of 27.2, women 26.5. Both means fall in the WHO overweight band for men and overweight for women. That puts Latvia 64th of 186 countries in our data, ranked from highest BMI to lowest.
Key numbers
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Estimated share in each WHO category
Columns may not sum to 100 because of rounding. Real BMI distributions have a longer right tail than a normal curve, so the obese share here is probably a few points low.
Latvia among its neighbours
What a given BMI means in Latvia
Read it as: a man with BMI 30 in Latvia has a higher BMI than 69% of men. Values under 1% or over 99% are shown as <1 and >99.
In plain language
The standard deviation for men in Latvia is 5.5. About two thirds of men have a BMI between 21.7 and 32.7; for women the middle two thirds run from 20.3 to 32.7. Compared with the global mean, men here are 2.7 points higher and women 1.7 points higher.
BMI does not distinguish muscle from fat, and the WHO bands were set on European populations. For South and East Asian populations the same BMI carries more health risk, which is why several countries there use 23 and 27.5 as their own cut-offs.
Questions
- What is the average BMI in Latvia?
- 27.2 for men and 26.5 for women, with standard deviations of 5.5 and 6.2. Averaged across the sexes that is 26.9, against a global figure of 24.6.
- What share of adults in Latvia are overweight or obese?
- Our estimate from the mean and SD: 66% of men have a BMI of 25 or more, and 31% are at 30 or more. For women it is 60% and 29%. These assume a normal curve, so the true obesity shares are likely a few points higher.
- Is a BMI of 25 high in Latvia?
- A BMI of 25 is the WHO line between healthy weight and overweight. In Latvia it is higher than about 34% of men and 40% of women. So for men here it is below the middle of the pack.
- How does Latvia compare with Albania?
- Men in Albania average 27.2 against 27.2 in Latvia; women 26.5 against 26.5. Albania ranks 63rd, Latvia 64th.
NCD-RisC does not publish standard deviations. SD for countries added in 2026-10 uses the global SD. Latvia is one of them, so the SD, the category shares and the percentiles above use the global spread rather than one measured here.
Source: NCD Risk Factor Collaboration, Lancet 2017, age-standardised mean BMI for 2016. Percentiles on this page are our estimate from a normal distribution with the stated mean and SD.
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Check your BMIAlso by country: Average height by country and Life expectancy by country.