Welcome to the happiest country in the world

Switzerland has been named the happiest country in the world by a UN-backed study.

The third World Happiness Report said the UK was the 21st happiest country, with Togo the least happy.

The report, also released in 2012 and 2013, is based on GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity, perception of corruption and a final indicator labelled 'everything else'.

The report is a legacy of Bhutan successfully petitioning the UN to adopt a resolution for countries to gather happiness data after Bhutanese ministers suggested Gross National Happiness as an alternative to GDP.

The ten happiest countries in the world

1 Switzerland

2 Iceland

3 Denmark

4 Norway

5 Canada

6 Finland

7 Netherlands

8 Sweden

9 New Zealand

10 Australia

(15 US)

(21 UK)

• • • • • -a

The ten least happy countries in the world

1 Togo

2 Burundi

3 Syria

4 Benin

5 Rwanda

6 Afghanistan

7 Burkina Faso

8 Ivory Coast

9 Guinea

10 Chad

More: [These are the happiest countries in the world]2