Uploaded November 2019 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago

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World largest armies ranking: Which country has the largest military force in the world? Here we compare the largest army size using active duty soldiers from 2000 to 2018 World Bank Data. We will also compare countries with military service; conscription and volunteer.

The world in which we live in is not perfect.
This means that countries need armies and guns and they also tend to go to war with each other.
Countries that face threats from within and outside their borders have to deal with different security risks. This kind of reality forces countries to raise powerful armies to protect and defend their interests.

We used the army size data from World Bank, total Armed Force Personnel.
World bank also cited from International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance.
World Bank rearranged armed Force personnel with this criteria:

- Armed forces personnel are active duty military personnel, including paramilitary forces if the training, organization, equipment, and control suggest they may be used to support or replace regular military forces.

It can be argued that 2017 India's military personnel(over 3,000,000) is exaggerated. We agree with those opinion. But considering the high reputation of International Institute for Strategic Studies and World Bank, we decided that data from World Bank is more accurate than any other data.


India has the largest active military in the world with over 3 million soldiers.
China has the second-largest military with 2.695 million soldiers and the North Korea has the third largest military with 1.469 million personnel.


Most Eestern European countries had been reduced military force as diminishing treat of USSR since 1990. Western Asian countries were forced to reduce military size by many conflicts. But many Asian countries surrounding China have been increased their military size.

In our clip, we also show the military service system and army size comparison.
Military service is service by an individual or group in an army or other militia, whether as a chosen job (volunteer) or as a result of an involuntary draft (conscription).
Many countries which need large army size still use conscription system. Those countries have possiblity to reduce army size as abolished compulsory military service in near future.

Countries with conscription in 2019
: Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bermuda, Brazil, Myanmar, Chile, Colombia, Cyprus, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, Greece, Iran, Israel, North Korea, South Korea, Mexico, Morocco, Norway, Russia, Singapore, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Venezuela

Source:World Bank, International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance. all data retrieved from 2019