In the annual UN-sponsored report, Nordic countries kept their places among the 10 most cheerful, with Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Sweden and Israel securing the top 5 spots. Afghanistan, plagued by a humanitarian catastrophe since the Taliban gained control over it in 2020, stayed at the bottom of the 143 countries surveyed. For the first time since the report was published more than a decade ago, the United States and Germany did not find a place among the list of 20 happiest nations.