Scientific background: WHO-5
About this test
The WHO-5 was introduced in 1998 by the WHO Regional Office for Europe and, with over a thousand validation studies in more than 30 languages, is one of the best-studied short instruments for psychological well-being. It's used, among other things, in primary care as the first step of a two-stage depression screening: scores of 50% or below are considered a sign of reduced well-being and, per common clinical practice, warrant further evaluation for depressive symptoms. Since 2024, the WHO itself holds the copyright to the WHO-5 and explicitly makes it available worldwide free of charge.
Dimensions
Psychological well-being
Raw score (0–25) multiplied by 4 gives the WHO-5 percentage score (0–100%).
Sources & license
Topp, C. W., Østergaard, S. D., Søndergaard, S., & Bech, P. (2015). The WHO-5 Well-Being Index: A systematic review of the literature. Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 84(3), 167–176.
The WHO-5 is copyrighted by the WHO and freely available under the Creative Commons CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO license (non-commercial use with attribution, share-alike). This English version uses the WHO's official wording.
https://www.who.int/tools/who-5-well-being-index