School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi

Malawi: School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female was 11.06 years in 2019. β–² Rising

Latest (2019)
11.06 years
Change on year
down 1.6%
World rank
122nd
of 193 countries
All-time high
11.55 years
in 2014
All-time low
2.62 years
in 1972
Years of data
43
1972–2019

School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi, 1972–2019

246810121972199520191972: 2.6 years1973: 2.8 years1975: 3.4 years1976: 3.5 years1977: 3.6 years1978: 3.5 years1979: 3.6 years1980: 3.9 years1981: 4 years1982: 4.3 years1983: 4.1 years1984: 3.9 years1985: 4 years1986: 4 years1987: 4.2 years1988: 4.2 years1989: 4.5 years1990: 4.9 years1991: 5.1 years1993: 6.6 years1994: 7 years1995: 10.1 years1996: 9.9 years1999: 10.2 years2000: 9.7 years2001: 10.1 years2002: 10 years2004: 9.7 years2005: 9.5 years2006: 9.7 years2007: 9.5 years2008: 10.1 years2009: 10.1 years2010: 10.6 years2011: 10.8 years2012: 10.8 years2013: 11.3 years2014: 11.5 years2015: 11.5 years2016: 11.3 years2017: 11.4 years2018: 11.2 years2019: 11.1 years

Source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics. Measured in years.

Analysis

In 2019, school life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi stood at 11.06 years.

That represents a change of down 1.6% on the previous year and up 9.9% over ten years.

Over the whole period, school life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi peaked at 11.55 years in 2014 and was at its lowest, 2.62 years, in 1972.

That places Malawi 122nd out of 193 countries with data for 2019, putting it in the middle of the range.

The long-run direction has been consistently rising across the 43 years of available data.

Averages by decade

DecadeAverage LowestHighest Years
1970s 3.29 years 2.62 years 3.6 years 7
1980s 4.11 years 3.9 years 4.54 years 10
1990s 7.7 years 4.89 years 10.21 years 7
2000s 9.83 years 9.54 years 10.09 years 9
2010s 11.17 years 10.58 years 11.55 years 10

Countries ranked near Malawi

  1. 119 Barbados 11.13 years compare
  2. 120 Togo 11.1 years compare
  3. 121 Gibraltar 11.06 years compare
  4. 123 Ghana 11.04 years compare
  5. 124 Benin 11.04 years compare
  6. 125 Paraguay 10.99 years compare

See the full ranking of 238 places β†’

More education data for Malawi

All data for Malawi β†’

Frequently asked questions

What is school life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi?
School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi was 11.06 years in 2019, according to UNESCO Institute for Statistics.
What is the highest school life expectancy, primary and secondary, female recorded in Malawi?
The highest recorded value was 11.55 years in 2014.
What is the lowest school life expectancy, primary and secondary, female recorded in Malawi?
The lowest recorded value was 2.62 years in 1972.
How does Malawi rank for school life expectancy, primary and secondary, female?
Malawi ranks 122nd out of 193 countries with data for 2019.
Is school life expectancy, primary and secondary, female rising or falling in Malawi?
Over the last ten years it is up 9.9%. The long-run trend across the full record is rising.
Where does this Malawi data come from?
The figures come from UNESCO Institute for Statistics, published as part of School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female (years). Statizoid updates them automatically from the source API.

Download this data

CSV Β· JSON β€” 43 observations, free to reuse under CC BY 4.0 (World Bank Open Data).

Share, cite or embed this page

Cite this page

School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi. Statizoid, drawing on UNESCO Institute for Statistics. Retrieved 20 August 2026, from https://education.statizoid.com/stat/school-life-expectancy-primary-and-secondary-female-years/malawi/

Embed or link this data

Paste this into a page to link back to these figures. The data itself is free to reuse under CC BY 4.0 (World Bank Open Data); please keep the attribution.

<a href="https://education.statizoid.com/stat/school-life-expectancy-primary-and-secondary-female-years/malawi/">School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female in Malawi</a> β€” Statizoid

About this data

Indicator
School life expectancy, primary and secondary, female (years)
Unit
years
Source
UNESCO Institute for Statistics
Licence
CC BY 4.0 (World Bank Open Data)
Coverage
238 places, 7,783 data points, 1970–2020
Last refreshed

Number of years a person of school entrance age can expect to spend within the specified level of education. For a child of a certain age a, the school life expectancy is calculated as the sum of the age specific enrolment rates for the levels of education specified. The part of the enrolment that is not distributed by age is divided by the school-age population for the level of education they are enrolled in, and multiplied by the duration of that level of education. The result is then added to the sum of the age-specific enrolment rates. A relatively high SLE indicates greater probability for children to spend more years in education and higher overall retention within the education system. It must be noted that the expected number of years does not necessarily coincide with the expected number of grades of education completed, because of repetition. Since school life expectancy is an average based on participation in different levels of education, the expected number of years of schooling may be pulled down by the magnitude of children who never go to school. Those children who are in school may benefit from many more years of education than the average.