Which international charities had the highest program-to-expense ratios in 2024?

1. Which organizations topped program-to-expense measures in 2024?

Forbes’ 2024 compilation highlighted Direct Relief as achieving a perfect 100% charitable-commitment score — meaning Forbes calculated that all reported expenses were directed to charitable mission activity and fundraising efficiency was effectively zero — and ranked it among the largest, most efficient humanitarian actors in its list of top U.S. charities with global operations ^[1]. UNICEF USA publicly reports a program expense ratio of 88.4% and notes that in some years reserves and mission imperatives affect the year-to-year ratio even while watchdog marks remain high ^[2]. Forbes’ broader Top 100 dataset shows a median/average charitable-commitment of roughly 87% in its 2024/2025 reporting window and lists other international actors such as International Rescue Committee (86%) and Save the Children (84%) as high scorers on that specific metric ^{[4] [5]}.

2. How do charity-watchers define and compute “program-to-expense” ratios?

Different watchdogs compute the program percentage differently: Forbes defines “charitable commitment” as program support expense divided by total expense using audited statements and Form 990s and reports an 87% average for its list, while CharityWatch recalculates charities’ reported program expenses to move solicitation costs that are reported as program into fundraising to reflect what CharityWatch believes donors expect, which can reduce reported program ratios compared with unadjusted filings ^{[4] [6]}. CharityWatch’s Top-Rated list typically includes organizations spending 75% or more of budgets on programs, illustrating that threshold-based approaches are common among raters ^[3].

3. Why do numbers vary across lists and what inflates apparent efficiency?

Two major drivers explain variation: accounting choices around gift-in-kind valuations and how watchdogs reclassify solicitation costs. Forbes warns that charities receiving large in-kind gifts tend to show higher program percentages because those donations require little fundraising and can be recorded at high estimated values, boosting program share ^[4]. CharityWatch explicitly adjusts for solicitation costs that charities sometimes report as program activity and cautions that automation-based scraping of Form 990 fields can mislead donors if non-cash gifts or reclassification tactics are not audited ^{[6] [7]}.

4. What about charities celebrated for cost-effectiveness rather than program ratio?

Organizations recommended by GiveWell — such as the Against Malaria Foundation and Malaria Consortium — are spotlighted for cost-effectiveness metrics like cost per life saved rather than raw program percentage; GiveWell’s assessments emphasize measured impact per dollar and directed funding decisions in 2022–2024, which is a different lens than the program-to-expense ratio and therefore not directly comparable ^[8]. Donors focused on outcomes may therefore prefer GiveWell’s approach even if a charity’s program percentage is not the headline metric.

5. Bottom line and reporting limits

Direct Relief, as reported by Forbes, and UNICEF USA, per its own disclosures, stand among the highest on commonly cited program-percentage measures for the 2024 reporting window, while many top-rated charities cluster in the 75–90% range depending on rater rules ^{[1] [2] [3] [4]}. Important caveats remain: data pools come from fiscal periods that often ended in 2023 or 2024, different watchdogs apply different adjustments, and in-kind gifts can materially inflate program shares — all of which mean program-to-expense is a useful but incomplete proxy for “efficiency” or impact ^{[4] [6] [7]}. The sources used here are explicit about methodology differences; absent a single standardized audit across all international charities, rankings should be read alongside governance, transparency, and outcome-focused evaluations ^{[6] [7] [9]}.