Yes! Kindness Boosts Happiness: Insights from the World Happiness Report 2025

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Here’s what I love about the 2025 World Happiness Report (WHR)^[1]: In a world that’s (often mistakenly) trying to find happiness and greater wellbeing through achievement, stuff or circumstances, this year’s WHR shows that kindness is an easy path to greater happiness for everyone.

But as you’re here, reading this kindness blog, I’m guessing that won’t be a surprise! Still, it’s nice to have our beliefs validated—and to see the connection between kindness and greater wellbeing in black and white…

First, let me give you some context…

Understanding the World Happiness Report

The World Happiness Report (WHR) is an annual publication that ranks countries by their citizens’ happiness levels, using data from global surveys that measure subjective wellbeing. Established in 2012, this report helps us understand what makes societies thrive—beyond economic measures.

The 2025 WHR focuses specifically on caring and sharing as crucial elements of happiness, examining how prosocial* behaviour (essentially kindness!) and strong social connections contribute to wellbeing across cultures and countries.

* According to Wikipedia, prosocial behavior is social behavior that “benefit[s] other people or society as a whole”, “such as helping, sharing, donating, co-operating, and volunteering”. The person may or may not intend to benefit others; the benefits are often only calculable after the fact.

A Few Facts About the 2025 World Happiness Report

The World Happiness Report is a partnership between Gallup, the Oxford Wellbeing Research Centre, the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network and the World Happiness Report’s Editorial Board.

According to Gallup the report “assesses the current state of happiness around the world and explores how the field of happiness science illuminates the differences in happiness levels on a global and national scale.”.

For the main happiness rankings and analysis, the report uses data from the Gallup World Poll, which covers 147 countries. And while the sample size varies by country, it has approximately 1,000 respondents per country per year. The total sample across all countries for the three-year period covered in the report (2022-2024) is 400,000-450,000 people globally.

So here’s what the research actually found…

The Science Behind Kindness and Happiness

So, in the 2025 WHR, the focus is specifically on the impact of caring and sharing on people’s happiness. Here are some of the highlights of how kindness boosts happiness:

Being Kind Boosts our Joy and Happiness

We’ve all felt the “warm glow” effect from doing good. That’s because when we help others, our brains release feel-good chemicals like oxytocin and endorphins, creating ‘positive’ emotions.

Simply put, we feel joy and a greater sense of wellbeing when we give. And I don’t just mean charitable giving: it’s about being kind to others and giving something of ourselves…

In particular, the WHR says that “generous behaviours are associated with—and often directly cause—increased wellbeing among givers across the world.” And this finding held true across cultures, age groups, and economic circumstances.

Acts of Kindness Strengthen our Social Connections

Acts of kindness strengthen our social bonds—which are fundamental to our happiness. According to the WHR:

Social connections are critically important for human health, happiness, and prosperity. People who are more socially connected tend to be happier, less stressed, more satisfied with their lives, less prone to depression, more engaged in their communities, and less likely to suffer from disease or disability.

Kindness (Prosocial Behavior) Also Reduces Despair

We all know that helping others helps provide purpose and meaning in life and boosts our individual wellbeing. And this years WHR specifically highlights (and dedicates an entire chapter to) how an increase in prosocial behavior helps reduce “deaths of despair”.

Deaths of despair was a new term to me, and it means deaths that are attributable to suicide, drug overdose and alcohol-related liver disease.

The Three Cs of Effective Kindness

This year’s WHR also shows that both helpers and recipients experience greater happiness from caring and sharing when they involve the following three Cs:

1) Caring connections

The report shows that acts of kindness or prosocial acts strengthen our relationships—and that helping people we know creates more happiness than anonymous or impersonal acts of kindness.

However, the report also suggested that the wider our circle of compassion, the broader our sense of connection—to our cities, countries and even our world.

2) Choice

Voluntary kindness brings more joy than obligatory giving. This includes flexibility, so we feel more benefits from helping others when we have choice as to when we help as well as how…

This ties in neatly with ensuring that our kindness is authentic. In particular I’m thinking about setting boundaries and not prioritising others at our own expense—so we can truly enjoy being kind, rather than kindness being a ‘should’.

3) Clear positive impact

Finally, seeing the tangible positive effects of our kindness amplifies the happiness we feel.

And now we get to the good stuff! Based on the World Happiness Report’s findings, here are five ways (backed by research!) to incorporate kindness into your life for greater happiness.

5 Practical Ways to Boost Happiness Through Kindness

1. Share Meals with Others

Chapter 3 of the WHR offers compelling evidence that sharing meals with others is strongly associated with happiness. The research shows that “sharing more meals is associated with greater life evaluations, increased positive affect, and decreased negative affect.”

Practical idea: Organize a weekly dinner with friends or family, start a lunch club at work or invite a neighbour over for a meal.

2. Volunteer Your Time

Volunteering is one of three key prosocial behaviors examined in the report. The WHR shows that volunteering contributes significantly to happiness, especially when you can see the positive impact of your efforts.

For maximum impact, make sure your kindness is authentic so you don’t feel obliged and don’t overcommit.

Practical idea: Find a cause you truly care about and do some volunteering—even if it’s just a couple of hours a month. And consider volunteering with friends or family to combine social connection with giving.

Final thought: C – Contribute is one of Fierce Kindness’ 4 Cs, and in it we suggest you take action on something that really bothers you in your community or world. This way we’re making a difference that aligns with our values, we also feel more empowered and more hopeful about the future.

3. Help Strangers

The report identifies helping strangers as a key prosocial behavior linked to happiness. During COVID, helping strangers increased globally, and while kindness levels have dropped a little since then, kindness remains above pre-pandemic levels. Perhaps we all see the need for increased kindness in our world…

Practical idea: Make it a habit to look for small opportunities to help others in your daily life—hold doors, offer directions, giving someone that parking space or letting someone in when you’re stuck in traffic. You could also embrace doing a daily or weekly “Random Act of Kindness” like helping someone carry groceries, or paying for a stranger’s parking or coffee.

4. Create Family and Friend Connection Time

Chapter 4 emphasizes that family relationships are crucial for happiness: “For most people in the world, family is a source of joy and support.”

And while some of us have more challenging families than others, we can also include our “chosen family” aka friends in this category!

Practical idea: Establish regular family and/or friend rituals and traditions, whether it’s game nights, weekend outings, holiday celebrations or any regular activity that brings friends and family together.

Example: Recently, a small group of my friends have started a ‘standing’ after-work Thursday evening gathering. Whoever can make it, comes. There’s no pressure to attend so it’s casual—yet definite! We do different things each week from hanging out in someone’s yard, dinner out, a walk or going to a play. And after only 3 months I already feel happier knowing I have this weekly connection with people I love and enjoy.

5. Donate to “Effective” Charities

Chapter 8 of the report shares that donations to charity improve happiness, especially when you know your donation is making a noticeable difference.

Practical idea: Research charities before donating, and find those that provide evidence/specifics of creating positive change.

An example could be when $20 = 10 mosquito nets, or $50 = 10 immunisations. Another way to see that positive change is to support a local charity that’s solving visible problems in your community.

Wrap-up

This year’s WHR provides robust evidence that while many people chase happiness through achievement or material gain, there’s an easier way: just be kind!

Beyond that, what makes kindness particularly powerful is its ripple effect. By integrating small acts of kindness into daily life—whether sharing meals, volunteering, or simply building connections—you’re multiplying both your own happiness and the happiness of those around you.

And remember, prosocial behavior not only benefits individuals but strengthens communities by fostering broader trust and social cohesion.

So join the Kindness Revolution now and help create that virtuous circle of caring, sharing—and flourishing!

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Reference

¹ World Happiness Report 2025

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