How many ham radio operators in each country?

Does anyone know of an up to date or fairly up to date list of licenced operators in each country?

There are a few lists on the net including on wikipedia, but all, including that one have some old data in them. With the wiki one for example it shows some data from 2020/2021, but many country's data are older. The UK stats are from pre-Covid lockdown and for sure they will be higher now.

Particularly interested in the countries or islands that have the least amount of operators on so I can keep the ear 'oles open for them.

Something I have noticed on all lists is that Italy does not have as high numbers as I expected it to have. I understand the US being at the top because of the geographic size and population, plus they have a entry level licence as we do, but just just like on CB there does seem to be many Ham operators from Italy active.

Not really the answer to your question but....https://clublog.org/mostwanted.php

Hi Neal,

The problem with record keeping is no one seems to take responsibility for it!!

I think Ofcom buggered up when they hadn't accounted for deceased operators and the numbers were wildly out. I'm sure a similar story occurred in other countries.

As you've probably seen the numbers of licenced operators per head of capita varies wildly from country to country.

The scary part is when you look at the numbers for 'Planet Earth'......the apparent number of operators is estimated at 3,000,000 (3 Million) worldwide........

Out of a population estimated at 7,674,000,000 (7.674 Billion) we account for 0.039% of the population!


Probably about time we all started being nice to each other.   


(The last comment was more 'humorous' but some could improve their 'welcoming' skills.)

Thank you both. I will keep looking for any such lists, though the more I think about and reading your post Victor, I am less believing there will be an accuratish one out there.

Thanks for the clublog most wanted list. Although there's no licence numbers for the locations it's given me some good ones to listen for. I haven't used the site previously and so just signed up so that I could see more data. Is the site widely used? I just checked out Lebanon to see where it was on the list as I had a quick one on 15m yesterday, and it is saying the last recorded SSB activity with that country on 15m was in Apr 2020. ..Not too fussed if the extended data is not current, it's still a useful list. I can understand why the one at the no1 spot is what it is.

Saw that story on Southgate Amateur Radio News a moment ago and was going to update this posting.

Well done Mark on posting this.  


There you go Neal, nobody knows.

We can adjust that figure I provided too, it means we're only 0.02% of the worlds population!

We definitely need to be much nicer to each other, dying breed mate.
(Including the idiot who likes keying over repeater conversations around East Anglia....poor show.)

Thanks for the additional info. I can see from reading through there are lots of factors that can be included or omitted from stats that can skew them sometimes greatly, and that's just from countries that publish some sort of data.

Seconded on being nicer to each other. Over past weeks have heard some very feisty operators during some HF competitions, some being just a bit rude, a few way overstepping the mark with their remarks to others on the air including the f word being thrown. Thankfully none directed at me. Understand some have a very competitive nature, but it's not called for and can be upsetting to some people on the receiving end. None heard were UK operators I should note. ..I'm going OT a bit.

I am surprised how many countries / islands are above Antarctica (talking about the most wanted list again, and not geographically  ). Are there that many camps there that operate? I have never heard any from there on 11m or on any Ham bands through all the years I have SWLed.