Africa's mineral giant, and its most marginalised population. The Democratic Republic of the Congo mined about three-quarters of the world's cobalt in 2025, and 89.6% of its people lived below US$3.65 a day — the highest share of the 49 African countries we cover. Population about 112.8 million (UN estimate; no census since 1984); GDP US$84.9B in 2025, growing 5.7% in real terms.
DR Congo in 2025 is a US$84.9 billion economy growing at 5.7% in real terms. GDP per capita is US$754 in current US dollars and US$1,925 on a PPP basis. The urbanisation share is 45.1%, up from 41.3% in 2015.
Kinshasa is the DRC's consumer market. In our data 13.2% of its households are middle class or above and about one household in a hundred is above US$15 a day. No other Congolese city reaches 6%. Mbuji-Mayi, the diamond city of Kasaï-Oriental, and Lubumbashi, capital of the copper province of Haut-Katanga, come next at 5.6% and 5.5%. Kisangani, the main city on the upper Congo River, is at 4.9%. Kolwezi, capital of the cobalt-mining province of Lualaba, is at 4.1%, level with Matadi, Mbandaka and Kindu. Kananga and Bukavu are lower still.
| City | Middle class or above 2025 | Above US$15 a day 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| Kinshasa | 13.2% | 1.0% |
| Mbuji-Mayi | 5.6% | 0.2% |
| Lubumbashi | 5.5% | 0.2% |
| Kisangani | 4.9% | 0.2% |
| Kolwezi | 4.1% | 0.1% |
Both columns are shares of a city's households. Middle class or above means above US$5.50 per person per day (2017 PPP); the second column is the share above US$15 per person per day, which is a subset of the first. Five selected cities of the 39 urban areas we cover in DR Congo. Cities are UN functional urban areas (the built-up economic area around a city), not administrative city limits. Pan Africa Data applies the DRC's national Gini coefficient within each urban area, so these figures size each city's middle class; they do not measure inequality between or within cities.
The DRC mined 230,000 tonnes of cobalt in 2025, about 74% of world output, according to the US Geological Survey. In December 2025 it signed a strategic partnership with the United States on critical minerals, and in January 2026 the state miner Gécamines announced a first 100,000-tonne copper shipment to the US. In August 2026 the presidents of the DRC and Angola signed a rail agreement worth about US$1.26 billion for the Congolese end of the Lobito corridor, the Atlantic route from the Copperbelt. At home, the Congolese franc gained 30.4% against the dollar on the interbank market during 2025. That is why dollar GDP rose from US$71.0B in 2024 to US$84.9B in 2025 while real growth was 5.7%.
Little of this has reached most households yet. In our data 89.6% of Congolese lived below US$3.65 a day in 2025, and in Lubumbashi and Kolwezi, the cities nearest the mines, fewer than one household in eighteen is middle class or above. Since May 2026 the country has also faced an Ebola outbreak, the deadliest in its history, with more than 8,300 confirmed cases and 4,000 deaths reported by early October. It is centred on Ituri and North Kivu in the north-east, far from Kinshasa and the Copperbelt.
Pan Africa Data publishes population shares across five fixed-boundary income classes on the 2017 PPP basis: marginalised (below $3.65/day), low ($3.65–5.50), middle ($5.50–15), upper-middle ($15–46.52), and high (above $46.52). The table shows DR Congo's national distribution for 2015, 2020, 2024 and 2025. Annual history from 2000 and forecasts to 2035 are in the full dataset.
| Year | Marginalised | Low | Middle | Upper-middle | High |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 90.1% | 6.6% | 3.3% | 0.1% | 0.0% |
| 2020 | 92.5% | 5.0% | 2.4% | 0.1% | 0.0% |
| 2024 | 89.8% | 6.5% | 3.5% | 0.1% | 0.0% |
| 2025 | 89.6% | 6.7% | 3.6% | 0.1% | 0.0% |
Shares only, each class rounded independently, so the columns do not always sum exactly to the combined figures quoted in the text. The DRC has not held a census since 1984, so every population total for the country is an estimate: the national statistics institute's last published figure, about 92 million, comes from its 2017 statistical yearbook, while the United Nations puts the 2025 population at 112.8 million. Pan Africa Data's population series follows World Bank and United Nations estimates so that figures stay comparable across all 54 countries we cover. Because the totals are uncertain, this page publishes shares only; the shares do not depend on which population total is used.
Gini coefficient in 2025: 44.7. Our inequality estimate for the DRC follows the World Bank's household surveys, 42.1 in 2012 and 44.7 in 2020; years in between are interpolated, and the figure is held at 44.7 from 2020. The rise in inequality between the surveys accounts for part of the increase in the marginalised share between 2015 and 2020. By design, the marginalised share matches the World Bank's estimate at the same US$3.65 line (92.5% in 2020, the latest survey year). The DRC is not one of the six countries in our published validation panel.
Every number on this page has been pulled from Pan Africa Data's platform and reconciled against source. Historical population, GDP and inflation come from World Bank World Development Indicators; 2025 estimates draw on the IMF World Economic Outlook (April 2026) and the World Bank Macro Poverty Outlook (April 2026). Urban population share and city envelopes come from UN World Urbanization Prospects 2025. Functional-city populations follow the UN WUP 2025 DEGURBA cluster methodology.
Pan Africa Data's income distribution model is calibrated against the World Bank Poverty and Inequality Platform at each country's income-group poverty threshold. Independent validation of the calibration against six African national statistics offices is published at panafricadata.com/validation. Full model methodology is at panafricadata.com/methodology. Model version referenced throughout this factbook is PAD-v1.2-2026.
Cobalt: US Geological Survey, Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026 (cobalt). Exchange rate: Banque Centrale du Congo, reported by Bankable, 14 January 2026. US partnership and copper shipment: Semafor, 14 January 2026. Lobito rail agreement (signed 26 August 2026): S&P Global Platts, reported by Mining & Metal News, 31 August 2026. Ebola: DRC government figures reported by Al Jazeera, 6 October 2026. Population: UN World Population Prospects 2024; Institut National de la Statistique, statistical yearbook 2017 (reported November 2019); the last census was in 1984. Inflation is the 2025 annual average (IMF); the central bank reports 2.3% year-on-year at December 2025. Cross-country comparisons use Pan Africa Data's 2025 figures for the 49 African countries with income-class data.
This page shows 5 of the 39 urban areas and none of the 183 localities we cover in DR Congo, as shares only, for 2025. The full dataset has every city and locality across all five income classes, with household and population counts, annually from 2000 with forecasts to 2035, in PPP and USD · API access · free 7-day trial, no card required.