China vs India: Emissions of air pollutants

China
20.99 million tonnes
in 2022
India
9.56 million tonnes
in 2022
China rank
1st
India rank
2nd

Emissions of air pollutants over time

  • China
  • India
010.0M20.0M30.0M175018862022

How they compare

China currently reports 20.99 million tonnes against 9.56 million tonnes in India, a difference of 11.43 million tonnes.

That makes China's figure about 2.2 times India's.

The two have swapped places 3 times across 273 shared years of data; in 1750 it was India ahead.

China ranks 1st and India ranks 2nd of 220 countries.

Individual pages

About this data

Indicator
Emissions of air pollutants
Unit
tonnes
Source
Hoesly et al. (2024) - Community Emissions Data System (CEDS) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Licence
CC BY 4.0 (Our World in Data)
Coverage
220 places, 60,060 data points, 1750–2022
Last refreshed

Nitrogen oxides (NOₓ) are gases that are mainly formed during the burning of fossil fuels. Exposure to NOₓ gases can have negative impacts on respiratory health. NOₓ gases can also lead to the formation of ozone – another air pollutant.