Which asian country has the shortest women bottom 10
Executive summary
Multiple recent compilations of national average heights place Bangladesh and Nepal at the very bottom for adult women in Asia, tied at about 152.4 cm, with Timor‑Leste (East Timor) only a few millimetres taller at roughly 152.7 cm, making these three the shortest‑statured female populations on most published lists [1]. Rankings vary across secondary sources and region‑focused lists that commonly include Southeast Asian states such as Laos, the Philippines and Indonesia in the lower decile, but cross‑country comparisons are limited by inconsistent data sources and methodology [2] [3] [4] [5].
1. Shortest women in Asia — what the surveys say
A synthesis of publicly available height‑rank lists identifies Bangladesh and Nepal as the shortest adult women in Asia, each averaging about 152.4 cm, and Timor‑Leste immediately behind at approximately 152.7 cm, a pattern reported explicitly by Landgeist’s Asia height review [1]. Other compilations and regional maps echo that many Southeast Asian countries have relatively low female averages — for example, Vivid Maps reports female averages near 152 cm for India and Indonesia and lists several Southeast Asian countries around 152–154 cm [3], while a social‑media‑sourced Southeast Asia ranking places East Timor, Laos and the Philippines among the shortest regional averages [2].
2. The informal “bottom 10” — recurring names and limits
When attempting to construct a bottom‑ten list from the source pool, the same names recur: Bangladesh, Nepal, Timor‑Leste, Laos, Philippines, Indonesia, Cambodia, Myanmar, and in some lists India and East Timor variants — though exact order and cutoffs differ by dataset [1] [3] [2] [4]. None of the supplied sources publish an authoritative, consistently sourced Asia‑wide bottom‑10 table with standardized year, age range and measurement method, so any bottom‑ten assembled from these materials should be treated as provisional and indicative rather than definitive [5].
3. Why rankings disagree — methodology and sampling caveats
Discrepancies between lists reflect differing data inputs: some sources draw on large standardized studies (e.g., NCD‑RisC summaries cited by aggregators), others on national surveys, travel‑site summaries, or compiled maps that mix years and age ranges; Wikipedia and methodological notes warn that sampling bias and self‑reporting can inflate or distort averages and that regional within‑country variation is large [5]. Several aggregators explicitly acknowledge that improvements in nutrition and healthcare can shift averages over decades, which complicates comparisons that mix older and newer data [6] [7].
4. Interpreting “shortest women” responsibly
Height is a population‑level metric shaped by genetics, early‑life nutrition, infectious disease burden, and socioeconomic conditions; short national averages are not moral judgments but indicators that may point to historical or ongoing deprivation in childhood conditions [6]. The available reporting repeatedly stresses that regional differences within countries and measurement methods matter: a low national average can mask taller subpopulations or urban–rural gaps [5] [7].
5. Bottom line and reporting transparency
Based on the sources provided, Bangladesh and Nepal are identified as the shortest women in Asia (both ~152.4 cm) with Timor‑Leste close behind (~152.7 cm), and several Southeast Asian countries commonly feature in the lower decile of country rankings; however, the absence of a single standardized dataset in the supplied reporting means a precise, authoritative “bottom 10” cannot be produced from these materials alone without additional, uniform source data [1] [3] [2] [5]. Readers should treat the named countries as the most consistently reported short‑stature group in Asia while acknowledging methodological caveats noted by the sources.