Which African countries are best positioned in the race for artificial intelligence?
December 10th 2025
The majority of countries on the continent covered by the index appear at the bottom of the ranking, and show low scores in the areas of development, research, business ecosystem, talent and infrastructure.
Egypt, South Africa and Ghana are the African countries best positioned in the global race for artificial intelligence (AI), according to a ranking published on Thursday, December 4, 2025 by the British weekly The Observer.
The Global AI Index (GAII) ranks 93 countries for which data is available based on their level of investment, innovation, and implementation of artificial intelligence. It uses 108 indicators covering the period 2020-2025 from 23 different data sources, including government reports, public databases compiled by international organizations, think tanks, and private companies.
These indicators include, among others, high-performance computing capacity, semiconductor capacity, the number of AI-focused startups, public sector AI use cases, the number of AI software developers, electrical capacity, research and development spending, the quality of AI governance institutions, the number of specialized training establishments, and AI-related patent activity.
These indicators are divided into three pillars (investment, innovation and implementation) and seven sub-pillars (talent, infrastructure, operational environment, research, development, business ecosystem, and government strategy).
A country’s overall score is the weighted sum of the scores of its sub-pillars, which are themselves the weighted sum of the various indicators within each sub-pillar. The sub-pillar weightings are as follows: talent (11%), operating environment (8%), infrastructure (16%), research (17%), development (18%), business ecosystem (18%), and government strategy (12%).
The score for each sub-pillar and the overall score are normalized between 100 points and an initial minimum score. A score of 0 was not taken into account to avoid giving the impression that no activity exists in the field of AI.
Egypt (47th globally) tops the list of the 16 African countries covered by the index, with an overall score of 13 points. This North African nation achieves its best performance in the sub-pillars of government strategy (56 points) and operating environment (38). South Africa (54th globally) ranks second in Africa, ahead of Ghana (61st globally), Algeria (65th), Morocco (68th), Nigeria (69th), Mauritius (70th), Kenya (74th), and Senegal (75th). Côte d’Ivoire, ranked 84th overall, rounds out the African top 10.
Overall, the African countries studied show very low scores in the sub-pillars of development, research, business ecosystem, talent and infrastructure.
Globally, the United States leads the world race in AI with a score of 100 points, ahead of China, Singapore, the United Kingdom and South Korea.
Walid Kefi
Ranking of the countries best positioned in the global race for artificial intelligence:
1-Egypt (47th)
2-South Africa (54th)
3-Ghana (61st)
4-Algeria (65th)
5-Morocco (68th)
6-Nigeria (69th)
7-Maurice (70th)
8-Kenya (74th)
9-Senegal (75th)
10-Ivory Coast (84th)
11-Tunisia (85th)
12-Rwanda (86th)
13-Benin (88th)
14-Zambia (89th)
15-Ethiopia (91st)
16-Sierra Leone (93rd)
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