Corrections and change log
The numbers on WorldRealDebt are based on official sources, but source URLs move, reference dates get mistyped, translations slip and interpolation parameters can go un-updated. If you find an error, please file a correction request along the lines below.
Change log
Updates and corrections that actually changed this site’s figures or data handling, newest first. Each date is the day the change went live, and each entry states the value before, the value after and the official release behind it.
· Correction — Korean debt figures in two stories aligned with the clock’s base values
The stories on household versus national debt and on the debt clock’s interpolation method still quoted 2024 figures (national debt KRW 1,196.7 trillion, household debt KRW 1,944 trillion), while the clock’s base values already reflected the fiscal 2025 settlement, so text and numbers disagreed. In all six languages the passages now give national debt of KRW 1,304.5 trillion (fiscal 2025 settlement, 49.0% of GDP, released April 2026) and household credit of KRW 1,978.8 trillion (Q4 2025 preliminary, released 20 February 2026), and the source notes name each release and its date.
Related: Why Household Debt Is a More Immediate Risk for Korea Than National Debt · The numbers on a debt clock are interpolated estimates, not real-time measurements
· Method change — Spain’s national debt now refreshed automatically from Eurostat’s quarterly statistics
Spain’s general government (Maastricht) debt used to be copied in by hand. It is now taken on a regular schedule from Eurostat’s quarterly government debt dataset (gov_10q_ggdebt), using the latest quarter available. When that quarter is provisional, the source label says so alongside the quarter, and if an implausible value arrives — for instance because of a millions-versus-units mix-up — the refresh is skipped and the previous value kept.
Related: Spanish EDP debt must be read within the eurozone framework
· Data refresh — Base debt values for all five countries re-anchored to primary sources — Korea’s understated headline corrected
The clocks’ base values had fallen behind the official releases. Korea’s national debt moved from KRW 1,196.7 trillion to KRW 1,304.5 trillion, the fiscal 2025 settlement; until then the clock had been showing about 45.3% of GDP against an official 49.0%. The US figure moved from $35.46 trillion (30 September 2024) to $39.4886 trillion on 15 July 2026 per Treasury’s Debt to the Penny; Japan to ¥1,343.8 trillion at end-March 2026 per the Ministry of Finance; Spain from €1.625 trillion (2024) to €1.740 trillion in Q1 2026 per the Banco de España; and China from 82.11 to 96.05 trillion yuan for 2025 per the Ministry of Finance. US and Spanish GDP values from 2024 that carried an end-2025 reference date were relabelled with their real year.
Related: Confuse D1, D2 and D3, and you will misread Korea's national debt
· Correction — Independent cross-check corrects Korean GDP growth, US population and more
A verification pass that recomputed each refreshed value from the raw data caught several errors. The annual growth rate for Korea’s nominal GDP was cut from 5.0% to 4.4% (the GDP level of KRW 2,676.7 trillion itself was confirmed by two sources). US population moved from 335,893,238 to 341,784,857 (1 July 2025), fixing an undercount of about six million, and US household debt was corrected to $18.794 trillion (end-March 2026) after re-reading the New York Fed’s source spreadsheet. Reference dates on US export and import figures were aligned so that calendar-year values do not carry a fiscal-year date.
Related: Why U.S. Federal Debt-to-GDP Has to Be Read Alongside the Dollar's Reserve Status
· Data refresh — Rates, prices, exchange rates and local-currency indicators refreshed; Korean external-sector conversion error fixed
Values left behind when only the big indicators were updated were brought current: the won from 1,320 to 1,480.4 per dollar, the yen from 155 to 162.29, the US policy rate from 4.5% to 3.63% (effective federal funds rate) and the ECB deposit rate from 3.0% to 2.25%. Korea’s external-sector indicators had each been estimated in won at what amounted to a different exchange rate (a current account of KRW 32 trillion implied about 260 won per dollar). Official dollar figures are now converted consistently at the 2025 average rate of 1,421.9 won, which puts the current account at KRW 175.0 trillion. Korea’s population was aligned with its source label: the total in Statistics Korea’s projection (51,609,121 for 2026).
· Method change — US national debt fetched automatically from the Treasury API at every build
US federal debt changes every business day, so a hand-edited value goes stale within days. Each build now pulls the latest total and its record date from Treasury’s Debt to the Penny API and computes the growth rate against the value a year earlier. If the fetch fails or the value falls outside a plausible range, the last verified value is used instead so that an error never reaches the page. Indicators that change once a year and need judgement about the source, such as GDP and population, are still reviewed and updated by hand.
Related: Why U.S. Federal Debt-to-GDP Has to Be Read Alongside the Dollar's Reserve Status
· Data refresh — Fallback exchange-rate snapshot refreshed
The fallback exchange-rate snapshot, used when live rates cannot be fetched, was refreshed to rates as of 26 June 2026. The same snapshot had also been refreshed on 26 June (rates as of 25 June) and 17 April (rates as of 16 April). This keeps currency-converted values from being tied to stale exchange rates.
· Correction — Structured-data update dates corrected to each country’s real reference date
The structured data (Dataset) read by search engines and AI crawlers showed the same modification date, 2026-01-01, for all five countries, although the real reference dates differed by country — the US national debt figure dated from 30 September 2024. Each country’s dataset and each metric now report the last official reference date of their own data, so the data never looks fresher than it is.
This page is the factual-challenge queue
A claim that a figure is wrong belongs here, not in the guestbook. The guestbook is a space for visitor messages: challenges left there are not logged, not tracked, and leave neither a reply nor a correction notice. When a figure challenge shows up in the guestbook, the operator moves it into this queue.
What to include
A useful request contains the page URL, the name of the indicator in question, the value currently displayed, the value you expect, the official source URL and the publication or reference date of that source. A screenshot alone rarely identifies the cause, so please add a link to the primary data whenever possible.
How requests are prioritised
A mismatch between an official source and the reference value in the code has the highest priority. When a source institution issues a revision, `baseValue`, `annualGrowthRate`, `asOf` and `sourceUrl` are reviewed together. Differences of opinion or of policy interpretation are handled as discussion, separately from data errors.
Handling procedure
Every request is first checked for reproducibility. If it is a genuine error, a test is added or an existing test updated before the data is changed. After the fix, `npm run test` — and where needed the Playwright E2E suite and a build — are run to confirm the site is deployable.
Correction log
Confirmed corrections are recorded with the date received, the affected indicator, the value before, the value after and the supporting source. The underlying change stays in the public repository commit history, and any change to a reference value is reflected on the sources page and in the API field `baseAsOf`.
Comments and personal data
If a comment contains personal data, spam, malicious links or clear disinformation, you can ask for it to be hidden or deleted. Requests to delete your own comment go through the same channel.
Where to file
Please open a request on GitHub Issues: https://github.com/eightynine01/WorldRealDebt/issues