Baháʼí Faith by country
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The Baháʼí Faith formed in the mid-19th century in Iran (West Asia), later gaining converts in India, East Africa, and the Western world. The Bahá'í Faith is established in more than 100,000 localities in virtually every country and territory around the world. Traveling promoters of the religion played a significant role in spreading the religion into most countries and territories during the second half of the 20th century, mostly seeded out of North America by the planned migration of individuals. The Baháʼí Faith was recognized as having a widespread international membership by the 1980s. Author Denis MacEoin asserted in 2000 that Baháʼí Faith was the second-most geographically widespread religion after Christianity.
The Baháʼí World Centre estimated over a million Bahá'ís in 1965, 5 million in 1991, and about 8 million in 2020. The official agencies of the religion have focused on publishing data such as numbers of local and national spiritual assemblies, countries and territories represented, languages and tribes represented, schools, and publishing trusts, not the total number of believers.
Analyzing Baháʼí data on localities and activity levels, Danish sociologist Margit Warburg suggested that by 2001, registered Baháʼís reliably numbered over 5 million. Other independent estimates, such as Encyclopædia Britannica in 2010, and the World Christian Encyclopedia in 2001, listed Baháʼís and sympathizers as over 7 million. The Baháʼí Faith was described in 2013 as the fastest growing religion by percentage across the 20th century.
The number of Baháʼí adherents is difficult to estimate accurately. Few national Baháʼí communities have the administrative capacity to enumerate their members and Baháʼí membership data does not break out active participation from the total number of people who have expressed their belief. Due to its small size, few censuses or religious surveys include the Baháʼí Faith as a separate category and some government censuses count Baháʼís as Muslims or Hindus. Country-level detail from the World Christian Encyclopedia (WCE), on which many estimates rely, counts declared Baháʼís along with sympathizers, leading to much higher counts than those of self-identifying Baháʼís.