Top 100 Countries by Budget Deficit (% of GDP), 2025

Q: Why is this a 2025 page if many values are from 2024?

Because the page is designed as a current 2025 comparison using the latest IMF snapshot that offers broad country coverage on a comparable basis. A stricter 2025-only approach would materially reduce coverage or consistency.

by StatRanker March 31, 2026 48 48 min read

Economy · Budget and taxes · Fiscal balance

This page ranks countries by the IMF measure of general government net lending / borrowing as a share of GDP, expressed here in plain language as budget deficit where the balance is negative. For broad cross-country coverage, the table uses the latest widely comparable IMF snapshot, which is still centered mainly on 2024 actual values and is presented here as the nearest full-country reference set for a 2025 comparison page.

Use the ratio as a fiscal-stress indicator, not as a scorecard. A deficit of −8% of GDP does not automatically mean imminent crisis. What matters is whether that gap sits inside a country with low debt, deep domestic funding, strong growth, reserve buffers, and policy credibility—or inside one already constrained by refinancing pressure, weak revenue, conflict, or external imbalance.

Indicator: General government net lending / borrowing Unit: % of GDP Negative value = deficit Coverage: full Top 100

Next: top 10 →Jump to full table ↓

Top 10 countries with the deepest budget deficits in the current snapshot

The top of the table does not reflect a single fiscal pattern. It mixes war finance, microstate volatility, post-crisis adjustment, commodity dependence, and structurally weak budget balances.

#1Timor-Leste

−41.13%

Timor-Leste sits far above the rest of the ranking, which usually points to a fiscal model where public spending is running far ahead of the domestic non-oil revenue base.

#2Kiribati

−22.39%

Kiribati illustrates how a very small revenue base can produce unusually large fiscal swings when public expenditure, external grants, and capital programs do not move in step.

#3Ukraine

−18.74%

Ukraine belongs to a separate wartime category, where defense, resilience, and emergency support dominate the fiscal picture.

#4Maldives

−17.88%

The Maldives combines heavy infrastructure and debt-service pressure with a tourism-led economy that can be sensitive to shocks.

#5Bolivia

−10.44%

Bolivia remains one of the clearer structural deficit stories in Latin America rather than a one-off crisis spike.

#6Zimbabwe

−10.40%

Zimbabwe combines macro instability, limited policy credibility, and a weak fiscal base, which makes even a mid-table deficit ratio harder to finance than the headline alone may suggest.

#7Sri Lanka

−10.22%

Sri Lanka is still carrying the legacy of a severe macro crisis, so the deficit has to be read alongside debt restructuring and adjustment.

#8Egypt

−10.14%

Egypt’s deficit is not just about primary spending. Interest costs and refinancing pressure are central to the story.

#9Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

−10.04%

In a small island economy, reconstruction, infrastructure, or disaster-related spending can lift the deficit sharply because the GDP denominator is modest and revenues are narrow.

#10Brunei

−9.92%

Brunei reminds readers that resource-backed economies can still run sizable deficits when expenditure commitments stay high relative to cyclical revenues.

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Chart 1. Top 20 budget deficits by % of GDP

The chart uses absolute deficit size, so the longest bar marks the deepest financing gap.

Chart fallback: Timor-Leste 41.13%, Kiribati 22.39%, Ukraine 18.74%, Maldives 17.88%, Bolivia 10.44%, Zimbabwe 10.40%, Sri Lanka 10.22%, Egypt 10.14%, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 10.04%, Brunei 9.92%.

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Full Top 100 table

All 100 rows are embedded directly in the HTML source. Search and sorting only help navigation.

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Rank	Country	Budget deficit	Fiscal context
1	Timor-Leste	−41.13%	Resource fund drawdown
2	Kiribati	−22.39%	Small-island volatility
3	Ukraine	−18.74%	War and emergency finance
4	Maldives	−17.88%	Tourism and debt pressure
5	Bolivia	−10.44%	Structural budget strain
6	Zimbabwe	−10.40%	Macro instability
7	Sri Lanka	−10.22%	Post-crisis adjustment
8	Egypt	−10.14%	Interest and financing burden
9	Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	−10.04%	Small-island capital cycle
10	Brunei	−9.92%	Commodity-revenue cycle
11	Algeria	−9.28%	Commodity-revenue cycle
12	Israel	−9.04%	Security and emergency spending
13	Malawi	−8.03%	Low-income fiscal stress
14	Romania	−7.79%	EU fiscal slippage
15	Syria	−7.79%	Conflict-related distortion
16	India	−7.78%	Large-economy fiscal gap
17	Bahrain	−7.65%	Commodity-revenue cycle
18	United States	−7.63%	Large-economy fiscal gap
19	Jordan	−7.55%	Structural budget strain
20	Senegal	−7.51%	Investment and financing pressure
21	China	−7.43%	Large-economy fiscal gap
22	Burundi	−7.38%	Low-income fiscal stress
23	Rwanda	−7.28%	Investment-led deficit
24	Brazil	−6.93%	Large-economy fiscal gap
25	Pakistan	−6.75%	Debt and financing pressure
26	Trinidad and Tobago	−6.72%	Commodity-revenue cycle
27	Vanuatu	−6.72%	Small-island volatility
28	Guyana	−6.23%	Fast-growth transition
29	South Africa	−6.23%	Structural budget strain
30	Botswana	−6.12%	Commodity-revenue cycle
31	Zambia	−6.10%	Debt restructuring pressure
32	Japan	−6.09%	Mature-economy deficit
33	Tuvalu	−6.04%	Small-island volatility
34	France	−5.96%	Mature-economy deficit
35	Tunisia	−5.95%	Debt and financing pressure
36	Mexico	−5.90%	Large-economy fiscal gap
37	Slovakia	−5.89%	European fiscal pressure
38	Myanmar	−5.79%	Conflict and instability
39	Burkina Faso	−5.69%	Security spending pressure
40	Poland	−5.66%	European fiscal pressure
41	Turkey	−5.19%	Macro and policy strain
42	Kenya	−5.04%	Investment and financing pressure
43	Moldova	−5.04%	Security and external shock
44	Iraq	−5.01%	Commodity-revenue cycle
45	North Macedonia	−4.98%	European fiscal pressure
46	Hungary	−4.95%	European fiscal pressure
47	Uganda	−4.93%	Investment-led deficit
48	Togo	−4.88%	Investment and financing pressure
49	Libya	−4.78%	Conflict-related distortion
50	Armenia	−4.75%	Regional security pressure
51	Ghana	−4.72%	Debt adjustment pressure
52	Nepal	−4.69%	Low-revenue budget gap
53	Belgium	−4.66%	Mature-economy deficit
54	Bangladesh	−4.64%	Public investment pressure
55	Bhutan	−4.61%	Hydropower investment cycle
56	Nigeria	−4.55%	Revenue weakness
57	El Salvador	−4.48%	Debt and financing pressure
58	Djibouti	−4.47%	Debt and logistics buildout
59	Hong Kong	−4.46%	Cyclical revenue weakness
60	Colombia	−4.39%	Structural budget strain
61	Eritrea	−4.36%	Low-income fiscal stress
62	Morocco	−4.27%	Investment and social spending
63	Panama	−4.26%	Revenue-cycle pressure
64	United Kingdom	−4.25%	Mature-economy deficit
65	Mozambique	−4.25%	Debt and financing pressure
66	Fiji	−4.23%	Small-island tourism cycle
67	Saint Kitts and Nevis	−4.13%	Small-island capital cycle
68	Niger	−4.06%	Security and development strain
69	Ivory Coast	−4.05%	Investment-led deficit
70	Italy	−3.99%	Mature-economy deficit
71	Malta	−3.99%	Revenue-cycle pressure
72	Papua New Guinea	−3.92%	Commodity-revenue cycle
73	Gabon	−3.89%	Commodity-revenue cycle
74	Philippines	−3.87%	Public investment pressure
75	New Zealand	−3.84%	Mature-economy deficit
76	Guinea-Bissau	−3.79%	Low-income fiscal stress
77	Madagascar	−3.76%	Low-income fiscal stress
78	Costa Rica	−3.71%	Structural budget strain
79	Benin	−3.70%	Investment-led deficit
80	Finland	−3.68%	Mature-economy deficit
81	Mali	−3.60%	Security spending pressure
82	Malaysia	−3.59%	Public investment pressure
83	Uzbekistan	−3.54%	State-led investment
84	Yemen	−3.54%	Conflict-related distortion
85	Latvia	−3.44%	European fiscal pressure
86	Austria	−3.37%	Mature-economy deficit
87	Peru	−3.21%	Revenue-cycle pressure
88	Central African Republic	−3.08%	Conflict and fragility
89	Iran	−3.08%	Sanctions and revenue strain
90	Montenegro	−3.06%	Small-economy investment cycle
91	Dominican Republic	−3.05%	Public investment pressure
92	Saudi Arabia	−3.03%	Commodity-revenue cycle
93	Guinea	−3.00%	Mining and investment cycle
94	Mauritius	−3.00%	Small-economy transition
95	Uruguay	−2.99%	Moderate structural gap
96	Estonia	−2.98%	European fiscal pressure
97	Spain	−2.95%	Mature-economy deficit
98	Bulgaria	−2.93%	European fiscal pressure
99	Tanzania	−2.90%	Public investment pressure
100	Sierra Leone	−2.89%	Low-income fiscal stress

Table note: latest broadly comparable IMF country snapshot, primarily 2024 actual balances compiled on the same indicator basis and used here as the nearest full-coverage reference for a 2025 ranking page.

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Methodology

The metric used throughout is the IMF fiscal balance concept of general government net lending / borrowing, percent of GDP. Negative values indicate a deficit and positive values indicate a surplus. The ranking is ordered from the deepest negative balance to the mildest deficit inside the top 100.

For country coverage, the page uses the latest broadly comparable IMF fiscal snapshot available across a large cross-section of economies. In practice, that means the Top 100 table is built mostly on 2024 actual values, because that is where broad coverage is strongest and most consistent. The page is labelled 2025 because it is intended as a current comparison page for 2025 users, built on the nearest full-country IMF reference point rather than on a shorter or more fragmented one-year sample.

Several limitations are worth keeping in mind. Fiscal years differ across countries; conflict-affected economies can have weaker measurement quality; GDP rebasing can change the denominator; and the same deficit number can imply very different risk depending on debt stock, financing structure, reserve cover, inflation, and market access. That is why the ranking should be read together with debt, interest burden, and external-balance indicators rather than in isolation.

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Insights and conclusions

1. The largest deficits belong to different fiscal stories. The table mixes conflict and emergency finance, microstate volatility, post-crisis repair, and structurally weak budget positions in larger economies. Treating all of them as the same kind of deficit is the fastest way to misread the ranking.

2. Small countries can look dramatic because the denominator is small. Kiribati, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Vanuatu, Tuvalu, and small island or frontier economies can move sharply in the ranking when one investment phase, reconstruction cycle, or revenue swing hits a modest GDP base.

3. A commodity economy can still run a deep deficit. Algeria, Brunei, Bahrain, Iraq, Gabon, Papua New Guinea, and Saudi Arabia show that hydrocarbons or mining do not automatically produce fiscal balance when spending commitments are sticky or revenues are cyclical.

4. Large economies matter differently from microstates. A deficit near 7% of GDP in the United States, China, India, Brazil, or Mexico has broader macro significance because it affects much larger debt markets, financing volumes, and policy expectations.

5. The same ratio can hide very different levels of danger. An advanced economy with deep local-currency funding may live with a 4–6% deficit far more easily than a frontier or fragile economy with weaker institutions, higher inflation, and narrow financing channels.

Next: what this means →Back to methodology ↑

What this means for the reader

The ranking becomes more useful once it is tied to a practical decision.

For investors: a large deficit can point to heavier bond issuance, refinancing risk, interest-cost pressure, or a future adjustment through taxes and spending restraint.
For businesses: persistent fiscal strain can affect procurement timing, subsidy policy, exchange-rate stability, and the probability of tax changes.
For migration and relocation decisions: deep fiscal stress can influence public-service quality, pension politics, infrastructure spending, and the durability of social programs.
For policy watchers: deficit data become much more powerful when read next to debt-to-GDP, general government interest payments, current account balance, reserve adequacy, and inflation.

Use the ranking to see where fiscal pressure is concentrated, then judge the risk through debt, funding conditions, inflation, and the external position.

Next: FAQ →Back to insights ↑

FAQ

What does budget deficit as a share of GDP actually mean?

It measures how large the government financing gap is relative to the size of the economy. A deficit of 5% of GDP means the public sector is spending the equivalent of 5% of annual output more than it collects.

Why are the numbers negative?

The IMF fiscal balance indicator is expressed as net lending or borrowing. Negative means net borrowing, which is the same thing as a budget deficit in everyday language.

Why can a 5% deficit be manageable in one country and dangerous in another?

Because the ratio says nothing by itself about debt stock, funding currency, interest costs, reserve buffers, inflation, or market confidence. Those surrounding conditions determine how sustainable the deficit is.

Why are some very small countries so high in the ranking?

Because a narrow tax base and a small GDP denominator can make one investment cycle, disaster-recovery program, or spending package move the ratio by several percentage points very quickly.

Why is this a 2025 page if many values are from 2024?

Because the page uses the latest IMF snapshot that still provides broad country coverage on a comparable basis. A narrower 2025-only cut would leave the ranking less complete and less consistent across countries.

Does a high deficit automatically mean a sovereign debt crisis is near?

No. Some deficits are temporary, cyclical, or manageable. Others are a sign of a deeper structural mismatch between spending and sustainable revenue. The wider macro setting decides which is which.

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