Philippines may attain upper-middle income status by 2028

Upgrade to High-Speed Internet for only ₱1499/month!

Enjoy up to 100 Mbps fiber broadband, perfect for browsing, streaming, and gaming.

Visit Suniway.ph to learn

December 10, 2025 | 12:00am

MANILA, Philippines — The country could officially be proclaimed as an upper- middle income country by 2028, signaling an improving economy and that Filipinos are earning more on the average.

World Bank Senior Economist Jaffar Al?Rikabi said projections for the Philippines’ gross national income (GNI) and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita indicate that the country is expected to surpass the upper-middle income threshold from this year onwards.

“Officially, we don’t declare a country as reclassified into UMIC (upper-middle income country) until it has had at least three years of consistent GDP per capita, GNI per capita above the UMIC threshold,” Al?Rikabi said during a press conference at the Makati Shangri-La Hotel.

“But from 2025 onwards, our projection implies that the Philippines is actually above that threshold,” he added.

The Washington-based multilateral lender projects that the Philippine economy will grow by 5.1 percent this year, cutting it twice this year from the initial projection of 6.1 percent.

It expects growth to pick up in the next two years, projecting growth of 5.3 percent in 2026 and 5.4 percent in 2027.

As of July, the Philippines still fell within the lower-middle income country category or those with a GNI per capita of $1,136 to $4,495 in the latest World Bank country income classification.

It recorded a GNI per capita of $4,470, only $26 short of the $4,496 to $13,935 requirement to be considered an upper-middle income country.

This means the average annual income per Filipino is around P283,215 (at $1 = P63.5), or about P23,601 per month.

Despite the rosy outlook, the World Bank said that risks remain that could slow the country’s trajectory.

These include weaker-than-expected private and public investment, fluctuations in global demand for Philippine exports and domestic shocks such as natural disasters that can delay projects and disrupt supply chains.

Inflationary pressures and currency volatility could also affect per-capita income growth, potentially delaying the formal UMIC designation.

Still, the World Bank said the country’s underlying economic fundamentals remain strong, supported by resilient domestic consumption, remittances from overseas Filipino workers and ongoing reforms to improve infrastructure and human capital.