Confusion over Bangladesh's position as old global ranking shared as recent
Recently, confusion has emerged on social media regarding Bangladesh’s ranking in the U.S. News list of the world’s most powerful countries. A graphic card circulating on Facebook, citing U.S. News, claims that Bangladesh has jumped from 123rd to 47th place in the 2025 rankings. On the other hand, some other posts claim that Bangladesh previously held 40th position and has now slipped to 47th. It all created further confusion after several media outlets ran stories on the ranking, making various misleading claims. However, Dismislab’s verification reveals that the list being shared is not from 2025, but from 2024 and this one-year-old ranking is being circulated as the current status of Bangladesh. A review of the U.S. News website confirms that in 2025, the platform published rankings for the happiest and most resilient countries, but it does not contain any list of the world’s most powerful countries.
Dismislab first came across the claim about Bangladesh’s so-called “global power ranking” on a Facebook page called BengaliVerse, which presents itself as a news and media website. The page published the post on March 8 at 1:46 p.m., featuring a graphic card that reads, “From 123 to 47: Bangladesh Now 47th Most Powerful Country in the World in 2025.” The post’s caption echoed the same message: “Bangladesh is now the 47th most powerful country in the world in 2025, according to US News & World Report.”
At 2:50 p.m. the same day, about an hour after the original post, “BengaliVerse” replaced the initial graphic card with a new one, keeping the same description but updating the information in the card. The new graphic reiterated the claim: “Bangladesh Is Now The 47th Most Powerful Country In The World In 2025, According to US News & World Report.” The post quickly gained traction, amassing over 10,000 shares and more than 11,000 reactions. Around 700 users commented on the post. In the comment section, the page shared a link to a U.S. News article as the source of the information, although the link has no information about the claim. Another comment included a graphic card listing the top 50 countries in the so-called ranking.
As the post gained momentum, several Facebook users (1, 2, 3) began re-posting earlier versions of the graphic cards that were originally posted by BengaliVerse, along with the version (1, 2, 3) listing the top 50 countries. The claim spread further when Asif Mahmud Sajeeb Bhuiyan, interim government adviser to the Ministry of Youth and Sports and the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development & Cooperatives, shared a separate card with the same misleading information on his official Facebook page. Multiple other versions of the graphic card (1, 2, 3) continued to circulate on Facebook, all promoting the same misleading claim. The misinformation also reached X (formerly Twitter), where several users (1, 2, 3, 4) shared similar posts repeating the old ranking.
In response to the viral claim, several counterposts began circulating on social media (1, 2, 3), offering a different narrative. These posts claim that Bangladesh was ranked 40th in the U.S. News list of the world’s most powerful countries in 2024, and has dropped to 47th in the 2025 ranking, adding further confusion to the discussion.
The misleading claim then made its way from social media to several mainstream media outlets (1, 2, 3), each presenting a different version of the story. The Daily Inquilab reported that Bangladesh had climbed from 112th to 47th position, while Zoombangla claimed the jump was from 123rd to 47th. Prothom Alo did not specify the year of the ranking but reported that Bangladesh has risen to 47th place out of 195 countries in a list of the powerful nations.
To verify the authenticity of the ranking, Dismislab searched for the report on the U.S. News website, and found that the ranking being shared online was not for 2025, but for 2024, and it covered only 89 countries. Published on September 10, 2024, the data for the ranking was collected between March 22 and May 23 of that year. In the 2024 list, Bangladesh ranked 47th among the world’s most powerful countries, and 71st overall.
U.S. News takes multiple factors into account in ranking the powerful countries. The American media outlet explains the criteria thus: “The world’s most powerful countries are the ones that consistently dominate news headlines, preoccupy policymakers and shape global economic patterns. Their foreign policies and military budgets are tracked religiously.” In addition, this ranking depends on some other variables, which are explained in more detail in the methodology for selecting the “best countries” section of the media.
Dismislab also fact-checked the claim made in BengaliVerse’s first graphic card, which stated that Bangladesh had risen from 123rd to 47th in the list of powerful countries. To verify this, Dismislab reviewed the previous year’s ranking, published by U.S. News on September 6, 2023. That ranking, based on a survey of 87 countries, showed a different position for Bangladesh, further clarifying that the claim of Bangladesh’s rise from 123rd to 47th place was inaccurate.
In the 2023 ranking, Bangladesh was listed 69th overall in the U.S. News report and 40th in the list of powerful countries. By 2024, Bangladesh’s position dropped to 71st overall and 47th in the power rankings. Both rankings were done and originally published during the Awami League government’s tenure, and not during the current interim government, as some social media users wrongly implied.
Bangladesh was first included in the U.S. News ranking in 2022, when only 85 countries were considered. The publication covered 87 countries in 2023 and 89 countries in 2024, making it impossible for Bangladesh to have ever been ranked 123rd. Additionally, Prothom Alo’s assertion that Bangladesh is 47th out of 195 countries is also inaccurate, as the rankings over the past three years have only considered a maximum of 89 countries.
However, while verifying the rankings for 2025, we found two separate reports by U.S News. One report, published on March 19, listed the world’s most resilient countries, while another, released the following day on March 20, highlighted the happiest countries. Neither of these reports included a ranking of the world’s most powerful countries.
