Life expectancy calculator

A calculator like this works at population level. It answers: among people of your age, sex and country, with a profile broadly like yours, what does the data say about average age at death? It cannot answer what will happen to you, and any tool claiming otherwise is overselling.

That is not a weakness if you use the output correctly. Population estimates are exactly the right instrument for comparing choices — which is what the simulator is for.

Age, sex and country set the baseline from published life tables. Smoking, physical activity, strength training, alcohol, sleep duration and quality, dietary pattern, body-mass index, known blood pressure, cholesterol and glucose, family history, stress, social connection and work type each contribute an adjustment.

Adjustments are weighted by evidence strength and then dampened, so a long list of small positives cannot compound into an implausible total.

Total life expectancy is a poor guide to how the coming decades will feel. Healthy life expectancy — the WHO's HALE measure — runs roughly 10 to 13 years shorter in most European countries.

That gap is where the modifiable factors have most of their leverage, and it is the number this calculator puts next to your lifespan rather than hiding.

Baselines come from WHO Global Health Observatory HALE estimates, Eurostat life expectancy tables, OECD Health at a Glance, and national statistical agencies including SCB, Destatis and ONS. Lifestyle coefficients are derived from large cohort studies and pooled analyses, each cited on the methodology page.