What does it take to live in Malawi?
To live there
- A month, housing included
- ≈ US$26
- To live off investments
- ≈ US$8,250
An average person in Malawi lives on ≈ US$26 a month, housing included.
To take that out every month, you would need ≈ US$8,250 invested. At 3.78% a year: the most that lasted 30 years in the data of US stocks.
It lasted from every start from 1928 to 1993. The worst start: 1929. That monthly amount rises with prices each year. What lasted in the past is not a promise.
Its returns are in US dollars after US inflation. Changes between currencies are left out.
30 years: a long retirement (Bengen, 1994; the Trinity study, 1998).
Malawi: in US dollars, with no official rate for 2024.
Questions
How much does it cost to live in Malawi a month?
An average person in Malawi lives on ≈ US$26 a month, housing included, at 2024 prices. It is a national average: a big city usually costs more. Malawi: in US dollars, with no official rate for 2024.
How much would it take to live off investments in Malawi?
About US$8,250, drawing 3.78% a year: the most that lasted 30 years in the data of US stocks. What lasted in the past is no promise.
Where do the figures come from?
From the World Bank's household surveys (2010–2025), brought to 2024 prices with the World Bank's price levels, licence CC BY 4.0.
What this figure measures
- What an average person in the country spends a month, housing included (or earns, in some countries). From the World Bank's household surveys.
- The surveys give it in dollars that buy the same in every country (purchasing power parity). With the country's price level, it becomes what that costs there, at 2024 prices.
- It is a national average, not a given city: a big city usually costs more, a village less.
- Your way of living may not be the average one.
Where the numbers come from
- What an average person lives on in each country, housing included: the World Bank's household surveys (2010–2025, each country its latest).
- Brought to 2024 prices with US inflation, then to each country's prices with the World Bank's price levels. Data of 9 Oct 2026, licence CC BY 4.0.
- Each country in its own currency, at the World Bank's official rate for 2024 (a yearly average, never a live rate). Without a rate for that year, in US dollars.
- One person, a month. Rounded to 1 under 95, to 10 under 10,000, and to three figures above. Only countries with official data are listed: no figure is invented.
- Provisional: read from a public copy of the World Bank's data, until the yearly download.
- A national average: cities differ a lot. Some countries measure spending, others income.