MacroSnaps20 August 2026
No. 40America has the world's biggest defence budget, but spends a smaller slice of its economy on it than Russia or Saudi Arabia.
Ukraine
37%
$65bn
Saudi Arabia
7.1%
$76bn
Russia
5.9%
$109bn
United States
3.4%
$916bn
India
2.4%
$83bn
UK
2.3%
$75bn
France
2.1%
$61bn
China
1.7%
$296bn
Germany
1.5%
$67bn
Military spending as a share of GDP, 2023 (dollar totals beneath each bar). Ukraine, at war, spends over a third of its economy; the US, by far the biggest spender in dollars, just 3.4%.
Why this is happening
- Countries at war or feeling cornered spend outsized shares: Ukraine is fighting for survival, and Russia and the Gulf states treat heavy budgets as existential.
- The US economy is so vast that even a $916bn budget, by far the world's largest, comes to only about 3.4% of output.
- Wealthy allies like Germany long under-spent as a share of GDP, sheltering under the US umbrella, a gap Europe is now scrambling to close.
The take
Absolute dollars show power projected; share of GDP shows the strain a country bears. By that second measure the US, despite the biggest budget on earth, is far from the most stretched; it has room to spend more, which is exactly what its allies keep demanding.
Source: SIPRI Military Expenditure Database (2023)