The United Nations ranked Lebanon in 80th place among 189 countries worldwide and in seventh place among 19 Arab countries on its Human Development Index (HDI) for 2017. Also, Lebanon ranked in 21st place among 53 upper middle-income countries (UMICs) included in the index. Lebanon's global rank improved by two spots from 82nd place in the 2016 index. However, Lebanon's global rank regressed by four spots from 76th place in the 2012 survey and by 14 spots from the 2010 index. The 14 notches decline in Lebanon's rank between 2010 and 2017 is the fifth steepest globally. 

The HDI uses three basic dimensions of human development, which are longevity, education and income, to assess countries. The United Nations considered that Lebanon has a "high-level" of human development, unchanged from the preceding survey. Further, Lebanon was one of 53 countries worldwide that have a "high-level" of human development. Norway has the highest level of human development globally, while Niger has the lowest level.

Lebanon received a score of 0.757 points on the HDI in 2017, up from 0.753 in 2016 and compared to 0.751 in 2012 and 0.758 in 2010. Lebanon's score was similar to the average score of countries that have a "high-level" of human development, while it came above the global average of 0.728 points and the Arab states' average of 0.699 points. On a global basis and among UMICs, Lebanon had a similar human development level to Azerbaijan and Macedonia, while it had a higher development level than Armenia, Thailand and Algeria, and a lower level of human development than Bosnia & Herzegovina, Venezuela and Brazil. Figures on individual components of the index show that Lebanon's results on the life expectancy and the mean years of schooling categories continue to be higher than the corresponding global averages, as well as higher than the averages of Arab countries and of countries with "high-level" of human development.